


Lord of the Louds

by aguyofmanythings



Category: Lord of the Flies - William Golding, The Loud House (Cartoon)
Genre: Gen
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2020-02-25
Updated: 2020-03-02
Packaged: 2021-02-28 06:21:33
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Graphic Depictions Of Violence
Chapters: 10
Words: 20,929
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/22889119
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/aguyofmanythings/pseuds/aguyofmanythings
Summary: When the plane carrying Mr. Cooper and Mrs. Wright's classes crash lands on an island in the middle of Lake Huron, knocking both teachers unconscious, the 1st graders (Lisa, her friends, and the former students of Ms. Shrinivas) and 2nd graders (Lola, Lana, and their friends) must survive and live on the island on their own.Story originally by TheLoudArtist15, posted with his permission.
Collections: TheLoudArtist15's Stories





	1. Stranded!

**Author's Note:**

> A couple of TheLoudArtist15's OCs will show up in this.

The students of Mr. Cooper’s first grade and Mrs. Wright’s second grade classes had crash landed on an island somewhere in the middle of Lake Huron, one of the Great Lakes of Michigan. The island is dominated by a tropical forest made up of palm trees, coconut trees, fruit trees, bushes, flowering plants, and other forms of vegetation. Located in the middle of the island is a huge, tall mountain comprising of light pink rocks and stones. The mountain is colored pink because of the reflection of sunlight and blue sky fused together. Surrounding the edges of the island is a beach currently hit repeatedly by small, calm waves. Seagulls fly above the beach and waters squawking, and a few reddish orange crabs crawl all over the coast, passing by some seashells and clams. The greenery of the forest, the pinkish mountain, and the beautiful calm waves bombarding the coast make the island a very picturesque scene from aerial view, or from a distance if one was on a boat.  
  
Somewhere on the beach is the wreckage of the private school plane the first and second grade classes once rode on. Smoke from the burning engines of the wrecked plane rose high into the sky exceeding the peak of the pink mountain. Many palm trees and coconut trees were toppled over as a result of the collision with the plane, and its nose is obliterated by a huge grey rock in front it, leaving huge scraps of metal dangling on what once was the plane’s nose.  
  
Leaving the crash site are the first and second graders of Mr. Cooper and Mrs. Wright’s classes who barely survived the plane crash. They are slowly walking on the sandy beach of the island, looking very exhausted. Their clothes are torn and ripped, and a few young pupils even had cuts on their faces, limbs, elbows, or knees. As they are distant enough from their wrecked school plane they suddenly collapsed on the sandy ground from exhaustion. The crash knocked them into fatigueness as some of them were injured. They may be tired and hurt, but at least they were still alive.  
  
“Lola?” Lana asked her polar-opposite twin sister in a weak voice.  
  
“Yes?” Lola responded weakly.  
  
“Are we still alive?”  
  
“I think so.”  
  
Lola looks around her surroundings. Her vision is a bit blurred, so she cannot really confirm that she, her sisters, and their friends are still alive. She then resumes looking back up at the blue sky, vision still blurred.  
  
“Ugh. My head hurts,” Lola muttered, placing her hand on her head. “My vision is blurred. I can’t see that well.”  
  
“Neither can I,” uttered Lana.  
  
“I can’t tell if we’re in heaven, hell, or purgatory; though, I highly believe we are in heaven or, hopefully, alive.”  
  
“Actually, we are alive, dear ninth eldest sibling,” Lisa corrected the princess, in a sitting position facing away from Lola and Lana. The Loud twins, as well as the rest of the children, all turn their attention to the young intellectual. The twins' vision also returned to normal.  
  
"In fact, the probability of surviving a plane crash is higher than dying in one with one in five million," Lisa explained. "It's also a fact that you're more likely to die crossing a road than in a plane crash."  
  
"Woah. That's crazy," Lana commented, sitting up.  
  
"Crazy indeed," Lisa then faces her older siblings revealing a crack on the right lens of her glasses, "eighth elder sibling."  
  
"Phew!" Lola is relieved, sitting up like Lana. "I thought we were dead, though it would be amazing if we were in heaven." She shrugs. "Oh well, I guess we'll have to wait eighty more years for us to finally go there."  
  
"Okay. Now that we know that we're still alive," said Winston, "how many of us are alive?"  
  
The young, wealthy boy stands up and begins counting his classmates and friends in order: himself, Lola, Lana, Skippy, Roxanne, Alfred, Lucas, Marcus, Mike, Gus, Meli (from Community Disservice), Lisa, Darcy, David, Greg, Jackie, Claudette, Chinah, Lexie, Lindsay, Francis, Charlotte, Petey, Jacqueline, Patty, Alex, Jessie, Mickey, Lotta, Lizzie, Carl, Adelaide, Jane, Julia, Mika, and the remaining being the rest of the first graders.  
  
"Okay. So all of us here are kids," said Winston. Suddenly, he realized that two people are missing. "Wait, if there are only kids here, then," he gulps in fear, "are Mr. Cooper and Mrs. Wright… dead?"  
  
"Negative," Lisa responded.  
  
"Lisa, Darcy, Greg, and I brought out our educators while we escaped the wreckage," David explained as he points to Mrs. Wright and Mr. Cooper lying on the sandy ground unconscious, their clothes also torn.  
  
"We performed an anatomical analysis on our instructors and ascertained that they were knocked unconscious when we crashed," explained Greg. "The resulting knockout was from a blow to the head."  
  
"We also discovered that they have a few bone fractures on their arms, but they're not as severe as to be considered fatal," added David.  
  
"To put it simply, they are not dead," proclaimed Lisa.  
  
"Phew!" Winston wiped the sweat from his forehead. The other pupils are also relieved to hear that their teachers are still alive.  
  
"What about the pilot?" Lucas asked the young intellectuals.  
  
"Unfortunately, we can't state the same result for the pilot," Lisa admitted, looking down in sorrow.  
  
"We we were about to save him, it was already too late. The pilot was found dead at the scene," David stated mournfully.  
  
"We performed an anatomical analysis on him also and ascertained that the cause of death was severe cerebral damage and severe skeleton fractures all over his body," the doleful Greg explained. "May the pilot rest in peace," he placed his hand on his heart.  
  
The children all stand up and remain silent, closing their eyes and placing their hands over their hearts as they remember the pilot that had saved them from death with his life-saving maneuvering skills.  
  
After a few seconds of mournful silence, Lana speaks up, "Well, now that we know we are all alive, except for the pilot, and we are stranded on an island, at least I think this is an island, how are we gonna call for help?"  
  
"Uh, hello!" Chinah exclaimed causally. "We have our phones." She, Jackie, and Claudette pull out their smartphones and show it to everybody. "We can just call for help, and we're out of this island or peninsula in no time!"  
  
The three girls try to turn on their phones, but instead a signal bar with a red X on it appears on the screens of each mobile, indicating that the phones have no signal.  
  
"Ugh, seriously?! No signal?! At a time like this?!" Chinah complained. Jackie and Claudette are frustrated as well.  
  
"Welp, calling for help is out of the question," said Gus.  
  
"Wait. If we can't call for help, then...are we stuck here...FOREVER?!" Darcy exclaimed in fear.  
  
Then, the young Homendollar begins crying thinking that they will never escape from the island and never see their families again. Tears gush out of Darcy's eyes like a waterfall. Soon, the other first graders start crying as well, feeling the pain and fear Darcy is currently feeling. In a matter of seconds, Mr. Cooper's entire first grade class, except Lisa and David, are bawling their eyes out. The second graders just stand there watching their first grade counterparts crying, some of them covering their ears due to the whining being too loud. Eventually, Lola could no longer take the crying. She places her thumb and index finger on her lips and blows, creating a very loud, whistling sound. The whistle was loud enough to make the first graders stop fretting and catch their attention; it also caused the second graders to cover their ears.  
  
“QUIET!!” Lola shouted after she stopped her whistle. Everyone, especially Mr. Cooper's class (though they are a bit teary eyed), now have their full attention on the princess. “We are NOT gonna stay here forever!” the pageant queen exerted, “at least I hope not. But that doesn’t mean we should just give up! Instead of crying like little babies, we should try to find another way to signal help!”  
  
“And,” Darcy sniffs, “how are you going to do that?”  
  
“Well…” Lola tries to think of another way to signal help, but can’t think of anything, “about that. You see, I don’t know. Yet!”  
  
Suddenly, Lisa speaks up, “I have a suggestion.”  
  
“You do?”  
  
“Positive,” Lisa confirmed. “Now let me explain. With calling for help out of the equation, we should try to make smoke signals. Smoke signals are the most effective way to gain the attention of rescuers.”  
  
Lisa’s suggestion for smoke signals reminded Lana of something. “Oh yeah! Don’t you guys remember?” She faced her second grade classmates. “During our camping trip from last summer, Ranger Marshall taught us how to create smoke signals in case we were lost!”  
  
“Oh yeah!” Lola continued from where her tomboyish twin left off. “I remember! We need to start a fire in order to create smoke signals! That way, when we see a boat from a distance we start the fire and make smoke signals, hoping that a crew member will spot the signals and come to our rescue! Lisa, you’re a genius!”  
  
“I believe I already know that, female sibling,” said Lisa, smiling proudly and adjusting her glasses a bit.  
  
"Hey! I'm the one who reminded us of Ranger Marshall! I should also take the credit!" Lana protested before crossing her arms in disappointment.  
  
"Alright. Umm…" Lola looks around her surroundings, trying to find a place to start a fire. "Where do we start a fire?"  
  
"Why ask?" said Gus. "We can just start a fire here."  
  
"All we need are short and small logs to burn," explained Mike.  
  
"And we'll use one of the nerd's glasses to reflect sunlight towards the wood," added Marcus.  
  
The princess ignores all three boys. She looks at the forest; then at the beach trying to find the location to set up the flame. Just then, she spots the pink mountain behind the many palm and fruit trees and gets an idea.  
  
"Hey! How about we go to that mountain? Y'know, the higher the altitude, the higher the chances of a boat spotting the smoke signal," suggested Lola.  
  
"She has a point," Lizzie agreed, facing her schoolmates and friends.  
  
"Wait. Does that mean we have to be hiking on the mountain?" Jackie asked, disliking the idea of hiking due to their current conditions.  
  
"Well, not all of us," confessed Lola. "Lana, Lisa, and I will hike up the mountain. The rest of you will stay here and keep an eye out for ships in case they row by."  
  
"Oh, phew!" Jackie is relieved as well as the rest of the pageant girls and the injured kids.  
  
Lola focuses her pupils at Lana and Lisa and orders them, "You two heard me. We're going hiking to see if that mountain," she points at the mountain, "is a good place to start a fire."  
  
"Yay! We're goin' hikin'!" Lana cheered.  
  
"Eh," Lisa shrugged. "I could use the exercise."  
  
"Alright then, follow me, you two!" Lola then turns her back on her sisters and walks into the forest. Lana and Lisa run after Lola to catch up with her. The rest of the children all watch the three Louds enter the greenery of the forest as they also keep an eye out for passing ships somewhere in the waters of Lake Huron.


	2. Climbing the Mountain

It took about thirty to forty minutes to cross through the jungle. Lola was not fond of the forest environment that can potentially dirty her dress more which it did as a few green smudges are visible on her lower gown. She had tripped on small sticks a few times and landed on some grass, smudging her gown. The hygiene-conscious princess always grumbled in frustration every time that happened. Lana, on the other hand, liked traveling through the forest because she hoped she will find some animals which she did as she spotted some wild frogs and pigs. Lola would always scold Lana for trying to catch a frog and forced her to release it which the tomboy angrily complied. Because of this, the tomboy would sometimes sneak off to try to catch the amphibian. When she does, she would hide it in her pocket so Lola cannot catch her; however, Lana would always get caught because the darn frog always had to croak so loud. After so many attempts to catch the frog and Lola's angry scoldings, Lana finally gives up and began focusing on the travel to the mountain. Lisa, like Lana, was fascinated by the beautiful greenery of the jungle and the animals and insects that inhabit it. Lisa would stop walking a few times to analyze a plant, animal, or insect. She would call the plant or creature by its scientific name and state a few interesting and amazing facts about each species to her older twin sisters, which Lola didn't really care, but Lana did.

After crossing the jungle, the three Louds finally reached the pink mountain. The mountain was really tall, its peak seemingly touching the clear blue sky. The young Louds took notice of the mountain's tall height and were amazed by it. Lola, though her idea was to climb the mountain to start the fire, was no longer up for mountain climbing as it was taller than she thought. Lana and Lisa, however, are up for it. Lana wanted to practice her rock climbing skills taught by Ranger Marshall back when they were at camp last summer, and Lisa, well, she just wanted to analyze some rocks and determine the age of the mountain to confirm the age of the island knowing that islands are formed from underwater volcanoes.

"Okay…" Lola uttered. "On second thought, how about we walk back to the beach and build a fire with our class?" Lola was desperate to avoid climbing the mountain as she knew it would involve getting her princess gown dirty even more, which she does not want considering she likes being clean, and it would involve a lot of work, which she does not want to do considering she sees herself as a princess and on the top of the hierarchy, not in the working class.

"Come on, Lola!" Lana protested. "This was your idea to climb the mountain, and we just traveled through the jungle! No backing down now!"

"Lana has a point," Lisa agreed. "If you want to increase our chances of being rescued from this might-be island, the only way is building a fire on high altitudes. Then again, we can still build a fire on the beach with our school companions, but our chances of being rescued will decrease by 3.0089765125908765 percent, or approximately 3.009 percent."

Lola is faced with a decision. She does not want to risk dirtying her dress even more by climbing the mountain, but she also wants to get of this island, if it is an island, as soon as possible, and the chances of a distant ship spotting their smoke signal will greatly increase if they make a fire on the peak of the mountain. After being conflicted by her choices for a few minutes, she finally makes a decision.

"Ugh! Fine! We'll climb this stupid mountain! But it better be worth getting my precious gown even more dirty if we finally get off this island!" Lola points angrily at her two siblings. She really hoped it was worth ruining her pretty gown.

And with that the mountain climbing began. Lola began climbing first followed by Lana and Lisa. It was a very difficult process. The three young Louds would always get scratches from their legs and knees by accidentally cutting themselves from pointy pink rocks. Their clothes also dirtied even more from the dust and dirt of the rocks and ripped even more from more pointy rocks, but Lola's gown suffered the most. Sometimes Lola had to use her knees to climb, and when she did her gown ripped. The ripping sound would echo throughout the island due to sound waves bouncing through the rocks; the sound would even startle Lana and Lisa. Lola's face, of course, would turn red every time this happened, but she held her anger in and kept on climbing. A few times the children grew tired from climbing so many rocks as their limb muscles began hurting, so halfway up the mountain they sat on a few boulders and rested for ten minutes before resuming.

After about twenty minutes of climbing, they finally reached the peak. As they made it, they did not hesitate to look around the island from the mountain's view. The mountain is surrounded by the greenery of the forest almost inhabiting the entire island if it weren't for the mountain getting in the way. The island is also surrounded by the coast as well as the sea by all sides. Lana does a three hundred sixty-degree turn and saw the glistening waters on all sides, indicating that the island is indeed an island.

"Welp, this confirms that were stranded on the island," stated Lana.

Meanwhile, Lola is setting up the fireplace. She places the rocks that she found on the peak in the shape of a circle. Then, she grabs the wood she collected from the jungle and placed them inside the circle. Next, she builds the wood in the form of a miniature Native American hut, and she is finally finished. She had successfully built the fireplace; now all she needs is to start the fire.

"Lisa, can I borrow your glasses for a bit?" Lola asked politely.

"Sure, dear sibling."

Lisa hands her glasses to Lola. The princess hold up the nerd's glasses to make one of the sun's rays to go through the lens. As a peck of sunlight shone through the lens, she slowly and carefully moves the glasses downward to aim the sunlight towards the small pile of wood. As the sunlight made contact with the wood, a small wave of smoke is admitted indicating that the wood is beginning to burn. Immediately, the wood burst into flames. Lola makes a small, but warm smile (no pun intended) as she feels the warmth of the fire.

"Fascinating," said Lisa. "How do you have the knowledge of aiming the sun's rays towards the wood at an obtuse angle to ignite the wood?"

"Ranger Marshall taught me and my former first grade class," replied Lola. "She taught us the basics of camping."

"Intriguing…" Lisa placed her fingers on her chin.

"Okay. Now we got the fire started like you wanted," Lana giggled at her unintentional rhyming, "I just made a rhyme," she then returns to seriousness and impatience, "now can we return to the beach and let the others know now?"

"Yes we may," replied the princess.

~~~

Lisa and the twins found themselves traveling through the jungle again after climbing down the mountain. Lana tried so hard to hesitate from catching any more frogs, Lisa analyzed more species of plants, animals, and insects, and Lola is very cautious when she walked worrying she might fall and dirty her dress again, which now was very torn and had lots of holes on the bottom part of the gown.

About halfway through the jungle, the three children stopped in their tracks as they began hearing squealing sounds coming from nearby. The squealing sounded like an animal in distress.

"Ugh, what is that horrible noise?!" Lola complained.

"It sounds like an animal in pain," said Lisa in her usual monotone voice.

Lana places her hand next to her right ear to listen carefully to the squealing, "Whatever it is, it's coming from the right. Let's check it out."

The group began sneaking through the bushes and plants, following the noise. The squealing increased in decibels as the group got closer to the sound. As Lana moved two branches of a plant from her face, they saw what was making that horrible, distressful squealing. A piglet was running and shaking in distress, but it was not moving. The poor piglet's left hind leg is stuck between two stones and is struggling to set itself free.

"Oh no!" Lola covered her mouth in shock. "Poor little piggy! We must help it!"

Suddenly, to Lola and Lisa's surprise, Lana begins sneaking up to the pig. At first Lola thought she was going to catch the pig and keep it as a pet, so she tried to stop her, but Lisa stopped her first, reassuring that Lana is going to help the pig, calming the angered princess down. At least that was what the intellectual Loud thought when Lana finally reached the struggling piglet. She goes through her pocket and pulls out an object Lola and Lisa would never think Lana would pull out: a shiny kitchen knife. The tomboy raises the knife high into the air as she prepares to strike it down at the poor animal; however, she hesitates as she looks for a place to stab the pig. Should she stab the pig in the back, or should she turn over the pig and stab its stomach? Lana even began quivering as nervousness took control of her body. Then, she noticed that the stones holding the piglet's leg in place is beginning to crack. The stones cannot support the force of the pig's struggles for long. Then, it happened. The stones break into pieces, and the piglet bolted into the plants of the jungle. Lana had missed her chance to kill her prey.

"Aw! Dang it! It got away!" Lana complained, clenching her knife in frustration.

Suddenly, Lana felt a sharp pain on the back of her head. Turns out it was Lola who smacked her in the head.

"What are you? CRAZY?!" Lola shouted in anger. "Why would you try to kill that pig?!"

"What else, Lola?! We need it for food!" Lana shot back. "We ate all of our snacks on the plane! We have nothing left! So we need to hunt for food as well as eat the fruit growing on the trees!"

"Oh, right," Lola calmed herself down.

"And speaking of hunting, why did you hesitate?" Lisa questioned. "You had your chance, but you hesitated for too long and the source of food escaped."

"Well, I wasn't sure where to stab the piglet. I also became nervous and I quivered as if I was scared to hurt the poor animal. Maybe I was. I just couldn't do it!" Lana explained as she sighs. "I guess I have to work on my hunting skills."

"I also have a question. Where did you get the knife?" Lola questioned.

Lana looks at her knife in hand as her twin sister asked that question. She grew nervous, "Well...umm...I found it on the plane. I was gonna use it to scrape butter on my toast, but I guess it's also useful for hunting." The tomboy smiled nervously at her twin.

"Sure you did," Lola squints her eyes at Lana in suspicion. "Anyway, we gotta get back at the beach. The others are waiting for us."

"Right."

"Come on! Let's go!" Lola ordered.


	3. The First Assembly

After about another fifteen to twenty minutes of strolling through the forest, Lisa, Lola, and Lana finally reached the beach where their friends and schoolmates were waiting for them. Turns out the kids were doing a few of their own things while waiting for the three Louds. Lizzie is marking an X with a long stick thinking that a treasure must had been buried under this very beach by a pirate who possibly visited this island about four centuries ago. This should not be surprising to Lisa and the twins considering that their adventurous cousin loves to go treasure hunting everytime she is on the beach. Lotta, the Louds’ other cousin and Lizzie’s twin sister, is sitting on a grey boulder looking very tired and bored. Suddenly, her enormous stomach grumbles, making the fat girl look down at it and rub it, obviously feeling hungry. Lotta is known for her humongous appetite, always feeling hungry, participating in eating contests, ingesting a huge meal every breakfast, lunch, and dinner, and grabbing every piece of food (even when she’s full) she can find. Lotta would even grab a snack every five minutes day and night, so it should not come as a surprise that Lotta cannot handle not eating any single piece of food for more than five minutes, let alone for more than an hour. Jackie, Claudette, and Chinah are trying desperately to get their phones to work. They held up their phones to see if they can get a least a speck of the signal, but to no avail. They grumble in frustration every time they still cannot receive a signal. The other pageant girls seem to look upset over their dirty and torn gowns. They were used to keeping their dresses clean and intact in preparation for a beauty pageant. Lola can understand that her friends are upset, since she embraces cleanliness like them, though they should consider themselves lucky that their dresses are not as badly torn as her own gown which is littered with holes. The pageant boys and non-pageant second graders are doing nothing but wait, not caring even a bit about their torn clothing and dirty faces. All they care about is finding a way to alert help so they can escape from the island. The first graders, on the other hand, seem to look scared for some unknown reason. Some of them would look back and forth frantically and even stare at the forest in fear for a few seconds before looking away. What are they afraid of? Did they see something that made them fear whatever that thing is?

"Give it up already, girls," Lucas told Jackie, Claudette, and Chinah. "Do you seriously expect to have phone service on an island? If this is an island."

"Shut up!" Chinah snapped. "Can't we at least try?"

"What's the point? There's no phone service. We can't call for help. Lola even suggested we make smoke signals to alert rescue, so what's the point?"

Lucas is right. No matter how hard they try, the girls cannot receive not even a speck of signal on this island; plus, how is an island uninhabited by humans and only inhabited by animals, insects, and plants going to have phone service? It's not like the animals are going to know how to use a smartphone and have any knowledge about the internet or technology. So Jackie, Claudette, Chinah have decided to give up trying to receive the signal. They put their mobiles away in their dirty purses and sat down on the sand, looking dejected.

Lucas, as well as the others, turns his attention to the three Louds and asks, "So, how was the mountain climbing?"

"It was a bit tiring," replied Lana, "but we managed to reach the peak." Then, she makes a casual face looking at Lola and tells Gus, "You've should've came with us! Lola here almost raged out when we were climbing. When we reached the top, her dress had a bunch of holes!"

This gained the attention of the pageant girls.

"Did you have to tell them that?!" Lola exclaimed, feeling rather annoyed.

"What? It was funny," Lana said.

"How would you like it if I told them you were trying to keep wild animals as pets?!" the princess fired back.

Lana is rather unfazed by the "threat" made by her twin sister.

"Uhh...how is that a bad thing?"

Lola is put in her place with that statement. Lana is correct. How is threatening to tell your friends that your animal-loving twin sister tried to bring wild animals to the group a threat?

"Ugh! Fine! You got me!" Lola exclaimed in an irritated tone.

She then turns her attention towards the rest of the group, "And in case you're wondering, we successfully started the fire on top of the mountain, so we should not have any trouble getting the attention of any passing ship if we have no trouble keeping the fire going."

The princess' announcement definitely caught the elated attention from all children. They gathered closer to Lola, a few feet away from her, and began talking at the same time. They really want to know what the pageant star has to say next.

"Quiet!" Lola shouted, silencing the children. She was overwhelmed by the excitement her classmates are feeling. "We can't be talking at the same time! If all of you are talking, then you won't be able to hear what important stuff I'm talking about!"

With that, the children remained silent and resumed listening. Just then, Gus raises his hand as he has something to say.

"Yes, Gus?" said Lola.

"I have something to say."

"What is it?"

"While I was walking with the beach with my home boys, I found this next to a pile of seashells." Gus holds up a huge, pink conch and shows it to the princess.

The pageant queen is immediately awed by the beauty of the conch. "Ooh, it's so pretty."

"It's a conch," stated Gus. "People who live on a beach use this as a trumpet to get people's attention."

"Really?" Lola asked curiously.

"Yep. Like this." Gus places the pointy end of the conch in his lips and blows, releasing a loud, farting, but pleasant noise. The sound was so high in decibels that it echoed throughout the island. If there was a person who was standing on the other side of the island, then he or she will hear the sound of the conch emitted by Gus.

"Wow!" Lola, a well as the other kids, are fascinated by the trumpet sound of the conch. "Can I see it?"

"Be my guest," said Gus, handing the conch to Lola.

Lola rotates the conch completely around, examining the content and structure of the conch. She admired every beautiful structure of it. She was especially fond of the noise it can produce. In fact, the conch is useful for what the princess will say next.

After scrutinizing the conch, Lola faces her audience and shouts, "Alright, people! Listen up!"

The children have their full attention towards Lola.

"She this conch here?!" Lola holds up the conch. The children see it and nod in agreement. "Well, every time you hear this sound," she blows on the conch, once again producing the loud trumpet sound, "that means that we're going to have an assembly like the one we're having, but instead of having an assembly here, we're going to have it inside the forest!" Lola points at the forest, "Also, if a person is holding the conch, then that person can talk. For example, since I am holding the conch, I'm the one who can talk. Got that?"

"Yes," the children roared.

"Good. How who wants to speak?"

There was a long, silent pause. None of the children had something to say. They cannot think of any questions they would like to ask the princess. Suddenly, Marcus raised his hand. He wants to speak.

"Marcus," Lola walks up to the boy and gives him the conch. "Spill, Marcus."

"Uh...aren't we supposed to have a leader?"

As soon as Marcus asked that question, whispers can be heard throughout the audience. They hadn't really thought about who is going to lead them. Obviously Mr. Cooper and Mrs. Wright are unconscious, so the children will have no choice but to take care of themselves, but they still need a leader who will give orders and lead the group.

"Oh right!" exclaimed Lana. "We don't have a leader! Who's gonna be the leader?!"

David gestures his hand at Marcus, asking him to hand over the conch. Marcus gives David the conch.

"Obviously our instructors can't be the leaders because they are knocked unconscious from the plane crash," stated David.

David then gives the conch to Greg.

"That means one of us will have to become the leader."

"I'll be the chief!" Lola exclaimed, placing her hand on her chest. "I'm the one who had been giving orders recently to everyone, so I'll be the leader!"

"I'll be the chief!" Lana exclaimed. "I've always wanted to be the one leading everyone."

"Hey! I called being chief first! Forgot who told everyone the assembly and conch rule as well as the idea of making smoke signals?"

"No way! You're gonna act like a bratty princess and abuse your power! I'll be the chief!"

"No, me!"

"No, me!"

"No, me!"

"No, me!"

"QUIET!" Lisa suddenly shouted, causing Lola and Lana to stop arguing with each other. "Bickering will not decide who will be chief. We gotta figure out some way to decide who will be chief."

Greg gives the conch to Lucas.

"I know! We'll vote. The one with the most votes gets to be chief!"

"Excellent idea, Lucas!" said Lana. "Okay," she takes a deep breath, "who wants me to be the chief? Raise your hand!"

Immediately, all of Lana's friends and Skippy raise their hands. Only the pageant kids and the first graders remained standing and did nothing.

Lana counted the many raised hands, "Okay. Not bad of a count."

"Alright," Lola speaks up, "who wants moi to be the chief?"

Immediately, Lola's friends and Winston and even the first graders raised their hands. The first graders voted for Lola because after seeing how she acted like a great leader the moment they crash landed on the island, they thought she would be perfect to be the leader. Lana is shocked to see how much support her twin sister is receiving.

Lola counts how many hands were raised and is surprised to see how many votes she received. "Woah!" She looks at Lana casually. "Looks I'm the one who's gonna be chief." Lana shoots at glare at her.

"Alright. Lola the chief it is!" declared Winston.

"Ugh. Fine. Lola can be the chief," Lana said, obviously upset. "But I'll only accept Lola's authority if she promises not to abuse her power and treat us like peasants," the tomboy glares at her twin as she says this.

"Fine. I promise I won't abuse my power," said Lola.

She then faces her audience, "Anyway, Winston here will be assistant chief, meaning he'll help me govern all of you, so you all better listen to him as well as me, and especially me. Got it?"

"Got it!" the children responded. Winston cheered silently to himself, knowing he'll be second in-command.

"Wait," Lucas realized something. "I just realized that we are all by ourselves. Left to take care of ourselves."

"Uh, we know that already," said Lola.

"No! What I'm trying to say that since our teachers are knocked out and we're left alone, that means we can do whatever we want!"

"Oh yeah! You're right!" exclaimed Lana. "With no teachers or parents around, nobody will tell us what to do! No more chores, no more telling what to do, no more school, and no more punishments! We're free to do what we want! We're free!"

"WE'RE FREE! WE'RE FREE!" the kids cheered with excitement. With no parental authority or supervision, the children are literally left to do what they like. It is every child's dream come true!

"Let's go swimming on the beach!" suggested Lucas.

"Let's go build sandcastles!" suggested Darcy.

"Let's go explore the jungle!" suggest Lizzie.

"Let's go make hula skirts and perform hula dances!" Chinah suggested with Jackie and Claudette agreeing.

"Let's go swim with sharks!" suggested Lana.

All at once the children began talking, suggesting more activities they could do now that they are liberated from adult supervision. So many kids are talking at the same time. Lola is overwhelmed. She can't listen to many voices at the same time. She can no longer take it anymore.

"QUIET!" Lola shouted, silencing the children. "I can't listen to millions of voices at the same time! You all forgot the conch rule? The only person who can talk is the person holding the conch! And speaking of the conch," she looks at Lucas and gestures her hand, "Lucas, can I have that conch?"

"Sure," Lucas hands the princess the conch.

Lola resumes speaking, "Before we can do whatever we want to do, let's change our clothes. Our clothes are all torn and dirty. Haven't you guys noticed that?"

The kids all began looking at the clothes, noticing the dirt marks and the torn places. They had been so worried about getting off the island that they hadn't noticed that their clothes were dirty and torn.

"I know we don't have spare clothes," Lola continued talking, "so we're gonna have to make our own using leaves from the trees and plants. We don't want to look all dirty, now do we?"


	4. Having Fun

After the conclusion of the first assembly, the children, ordered by Chief Lola, began collecting materials the jungle-dominated island had to offer. The kids collected sticks, twigs, leaves, grass, flowers, and stones. Some of the youngsters even climbed the fruit trees and collected some fruit so they can eat for the upcoming dinner. They brought the supplies and food to the beach and organized them into piles separating each material. Finally, each child grabs each material and begins using them to make clothing. During the first assembly, the youth had noticed that their clothes are dirty and torn, and since they do not have extra clothes they have no choice but to discard their old clothes and create new ones using the materials the island provided for them.  
  
The boys and girls gathered a pile of leaves and sticks and used them to build skirts. Then, the girls, excluding Jackie, Claudette, and Chinah, collected more leaves and sticks and utilized them to create some sorts of bras. Jackie, Claudette, and Chinah, on the other hand, collected grass, flowers, and one stick because they are planning to build Hawaiian skirts, since they are planning to perform a hula dance once Lola announces that the children can have free time. The three girls also made a necklace made up of pink flowers and a string reminiscent of that of Hawaiian necklaces. The kids also used long wooden sticks and stones to build spears for hunting. They sharpen the stones by scrapping then on bigger and heavier stones; then they use a vine to tie the sharpened stones to the sticks.  
  
After the plant-made clothes and weapons are built, the boys and girls split off into two groups based on gender---for privacy reasons---and head into the forest to change into their newly-made clothes. Once they changed, they headed back to the beach and waited for Lola’s next orders. The boys are wearing their leaf-made skirts that covered their rumps and body parts that defined their gender, exposing their torsos and legs; the girls are wearing their leaf-made bras that covered their chests and leaf-made skirts that secreted their private body parts and behinds, exposing their midriffs and legs. Jackie, Chinah, and Claudette, on the other hand, are wearing their grass-made Hawaiian skirts and necklaces, the latter of which is secreting their chests.  
  
All children are in line formation and holding their spears like soldiers preparing for a military drill. Suddenly, Lola comes out from the forest and walks in front of the children, watching them sternly like a military general. She is wearing the same hand-made clothing the girls are wearing with her tummy unconcealed, but she is wearing one object that helped the princess stand out from the rest of the youth. Lola is wearing what looks like a crown, but it is made out of leaves and grass. A red grape is plastered in the middle of the crown-shaped leaves and grass, marking it as the jewel of the crown.  
  
Holding the conch, Lola speaks, “Lana.”  
  
“Yes, chief?” Lana responded.  
  
“I would like for you to stand next to me,” Lola ordered in her soft, princess-like accent.  
  
As told, Lana stands next to her sister and faces the group.  
  
“That goes for you too, my prince,” Lola’s eyes look at Winston, again talking in her soft tone.  
  
“My pleasure, my princess,” Winston replied in his chivalrous British accent. Like Lana, he stands next to his princess and faces the group.  
  
As everything is in order, Lola faces her attention at her subjects and resumes speaking, “I would like to announce that Lana will be the leader of the hunting group. When Lisa, Lana, and I were traveling through the jungle, we saw a pig whose leg was stuck between two stones.”  
  
The children all made saddened faces, feeling terrible for the little piglet.  
  
“Then, to Lisa’s and my surprise, Lana crept up to the little piggy and tried to stab it! Y’know, hunting? For food? But for some reason, she didn’t, claiming that she’s too nervous to kill animals for food.”  
  
Lana was hit by a wave of sadness and guilt as Lola mentioned the tomboy’s failure to kill the piglet. She would’ve done it if she hadn’t hesitated for too long, but the emotion she felt at the scene stopped her from doing so. If she is going to be the leader of hunting, she’ll have to try to suppress the feeling so she can kill for food.  
  
“Despite this, I’m still assigning her as the captain of the hunters because she has the potential to kill for food. All she needs to do is try to kill an animal instead of hesitating for too long. And with that,” Lola faces Lana, “who will be part of your hunting group?” She hands her the conch.  
  
The tomboy’s desolence suddenly fills with exhilaration. “Is it necessary to ask that question, Lols? You already know who am I gonna pick! My friends, of course!”  
  
The messy kids and Lizzie became beamed as Lana mentioned them.  
  
“Come on up, guys!” the tomboyish twin ordered his friends.  
  
All of Lana’s friends walked up in front of the group to join Lana. As this was settled, Lola takes the conch from her twin and once again pays attention to her fellow subjects. “Alright! With that settled, are there any questions?”  
  
The kids all shook their heads.  
  
“Well, in that case, since there are no adults, what do you say we have some FUN!”  
  
The children all cheered as Lola finally announced the event they all had been waiting for since the first assembly.  
  


* * *

  
Sardines swam about under the shallow waters of Lake Huron very close to the beach. The ocean floor rose as the fishes swam closer to the beach until disappearing upward to the surface. The sardines stopped swimming and inspected the floor that disappeared above water. Suddenly, a pair of light-skinned human feet came down from the surface and touched the floor, creating a few bubbles. The sardines scattered away. Then, human hands scoops up some water and throws them out of under the water surface, creating a splash. Adelaide and Carl are standing at the shallowest waters splashing each other and giggling, obviously having fun. The rest of the children are scattered all around the beach doing their own activities. Since there are absolutely no adults around to supervise them, the kids are literally left to do whatever they want.  
  
Lana and her hunting group, minus Lizzie and Gus, are near the forest spinning their spears and stabbing the air, practicing their hunting skills. The hunters are in line formation like soldiers with Lana in front of them since she is the captain. They all let out a single "Ha!" as they stab the air with their spears. Under a pair of trees, Jackie, Chinah, and Claudette are performing their hula dance. Gus is standing a few feet away from the girls to the right playing Hawaiian music on a guitar that he found inside the wrecked plane. The hula girls all proudly sway their hula skirts and dance to the rhythm of the music. Gus smiles at the three girls hula dancing. On the sandy beach, Lizzie, being the treasure hunter she is, is digging a hole in the middle of the sandy beach searching for supposed treasure. The adventurous Loud cousin had already dug a deep hole, leaving behind a huge pile of sand next to the hole. Lizzie wipes a sweat from her forehead and continues digging. Sitting on a huge stone next to the hula dancers is Lizzie’s overweight, polar-opposite twin Lotta, gorging on fruit. Since it’s been a while since she last ate it’s no surprise that she is extremely hungry. When she finished eating a fruit she grabs another one from the fruit pile she had collected and gobbles it up. In almost no time she finished eating the entire pile. Lotta rubs her full stomach and lets out a sigh of satisfaction. She looks to her left where her dumbbells she built made out of big stones and sticks lay and picks one up. She then begins lifting the dumbbell. It may not look like it, but working out is Lotta’s other favorite hobby made possible by her superhuman strength. On the beach, the pageant boys, sans Winston, are painting the nails of the pageant girls, sans Lola, using the makeup the young ladies had saved from the plane. The girls relax on the sandy beach and satisfyingly watch the reddish orange sky. A few feet away from the pageant kids, Lisa, David, and Greg are observing a turtle laying her eggs under the sand. As the creature is done, the young scholars pull out their clipboards and take notes. Darcy and the other first graders, like Adelaide and Carl, are playing in the shallow waters of the sea and having fun.  
  
While the children enjoy their free time, Lola watches the picturesque view of the reddish orange sun setting behind the horizon on her throne made up of leaves, logs, and grass. Honestly, sitting on plant leaves is very relaxing to the pageant star now-turned chief of the island. Winston, as assistance chief, stands next to the throne also watching the sunset.  
  
“I’ll say, my princess,” Winston began. “First day of chiefdom and we’ve got everyone under control! Well, except for the fact that the kids are going wild now that there are no adults around to supervise us.”  
  
“Yep,” Lola agreed. “Goodbye, grownups’ tyranny; hello, kids’ freedom!”  
  
“Speaking off,” Winston tilts his head towards Lola, “how long can you control the group?”  
  
“As long as I can. Until we finally get rescued.”  
  
“And when do you think we’ll be rescued?”  
  
"I don’t know,” Lola shrugged. “Tonight, the next day, next week, next month, heck maybe when we finally become teenagers or adults. Or maybe we'll stay on this island for a long time until we die of old age, or starvation if we run out of food."  
  
"It's why we need to start a fire on top of the mountain, huh?" said Winston.  
  
"Exactly," said Lola.  
  
"It's only a matter of time," Winston stated as he looks back at the sunset.


	5. You Let the Fire Out!

**WARNING: Contains foul language.**  
  
The children enjoyed their fun until the sun completely went down the horizon, and there is nothing but little dots of stars shining on the now-blackened sky. Most of the kids did not notice that it became night because they were too focused on their free time. Before going to sleep, Chief Lola ordered everyone to build shelters where they will sleep inside to shelter them from the rain that might come later during night as well as protection from potential wild predators. As ordered, the children entered the forest and began collecting vines and long but light logs so they can use them to build huts. It took a while to build these huts, but they managed to finish building the huts not that late into the night. By the time they finished constructing their shelters, all of the children suddenly felt tired and did not hesitate to enter their respective huts the moment they were done. For the remainder of the night, the children caught some Z's inside their huts.  
  


* * *

  
As the sun began rising above the horizon, indicating the start of next morning, Lola and her tribe led an expedition through the jungle. During the expedition, the tribe was divided into three groups in line formation with the princess obviously leading all three lines. One line consisted of the pageant girls and the young male pageant judges, including Carl and Adelaide; the second line of Lana and her friends, including Lizzie and Lotta; and the third line of the three highly intelligent kids and the other first graders. Like last time, the expedition lasted about fifteen to twenty minutes before finally reaching their destination: the pink mountain of the island.  
  
"Wow. That's a huge mountain," Lucas pointed out, staring at the mountain in astonishment.  
  
"Don't worry, people. To get to the top of the mountain, all we have to do is climb," Lola told her tribe.  
  
"Or we could use that path to walk to the top of the mountain," Darcy points to a rampy trail that spirals around the mountain, eventually leading to the peak. Lola, as well as Lana and Lisa, noticed the path and immediately felt like idiots for not noticing it before. They could've used that path instead of choosing the fatguiging climb-the-mountain option.  
  
"Dang it!" Lola facepalmed. "Why didn't I notice that before?!"  
  
And so the hike towards the top of the mountain began. As they were hiking, the children began chanting about being stranded on the island as well as celebrating how they are free from parental authority and the rules set up by the adults and civilization in general:  
  


_We are stranded on an island_

_Trying to find a way home_

_Being rescued may be a good thing_

_But being stranded is even better!_

_There are no grownups to control us_

_We are absolutely free!_

_We can do whatever we want_

_Without getting in trouble!_

_No more rules!_

_No more homework!_

_No more being grounded!_

_No more detentions!_

_No more schoolwork!_

_We are absolutely free!_

  
The higher the children hiked the mountain, the more cheerful the children sounded when they repeated their chant. Eventually, they bursted into elated celebration as they finally reached the peak.  
  
"Man, it feels awesome to be away from grownups!" Gus cheered.  
  
"I know, right?!" exclaimed Petey Wimple. "Now get to eat glue without being told off by Mr. Cooper!" He pulled out a pail of glue and began using the paintbrush to eat it, causing some children to watch in disgust.  
  
"And I get to bite anything I want!" Charlotte shouted cheerfully as she pulled out an apple and bites it hard.  
  
"Alright, people!" Lola spoke in a high voice, catching the attention of her tribe. "Freedom aside, we need to build a fire so we can make smoke signals and hopefully catch the attention of a passing-by ship!"  
  
"Yes ma'am!" the children saluted like soldiers.  
  
Lola turns her attention to Lana and the other hunters, "And the hunters will not go hunt until I say so in case no ship passes by! Got it?!"  
  
"Yes, chief!" the hunters responded without defiance.  
  
"Good!" Lola looks at her younger, smarter sister. "Lisa! Glasses, please." She gestured her hand.  
  
"Right away, elder sibling," Lisa takes off her glasses and approaches her sibling-in-authority. She hands her glasses to her.  
  
"Thank you," Lola gently takes Lisa's glasses and aims it at the sun, which is now thousands of meters above the horizon. The sunlight shines through the lens, landing at Lola's left chest and causing a leaf to begin burning. Then, the princess aims the glasses toward the fireplace she hand built yesterday. The moment the sunlight made contact with the now-burnt sticks, the tip burst into flames. The children, especially the first graders and excluding the nerdy kids, are all impressed by how the stick burst into flames just by making contact with one of the sun's rays. Then again, the sun does emit very hot rays.  
  
"Wa-lah! Fire!" Lola uttered. "Now all we have to do is to wait for a ship to pass by."  
  


* * *

  
It has been an hour since Lola made the fire and the tribe began waiting for a ship to pass by the island. So far, nothing. Most children, even Lola herself, began growing impatient as time passed by. Some of the children's stomachs even began begging for food as the kids hadn't eaten any breakfast yet.  
  
"Ugh! Cousin Lola, can we go hunt for breakfast now? I'm getting hungry!" Lotta complained, rubbing her starving, gigantic stomach.  
  
"No! We're not going to hunt for breakfast yet!" Lola shouted. "There's still a chance a ship might pass by!"  
  
"But we've been waiting for exactly one hour, three minutes, and five seconds, and still counting!" Lisa pointed out.  
  
"Not to mention we're way past our breakfast time. I highly suggest we should start searching for good," David suggested.  
  
"I said NO!" Lola yelled, getting angry. "We are not getting off this peak until no ship passes by during the next hour! Don't you guys want to be rescued?!"  
  
The kids all groaned in annoyance at this, causing Lola to grow more angry, but she held her anger in, knowing that she made it clear that no one, and absolutely NO ONE, will leave the peak until no ship passes by for another hour.  
  
Silence takes over the tribe for a few seconds. The children continue to wait for a ship to sail by the island while also wishing they were eating food while at it. Patty's stomach growls in hunger, causing the poor girl to hold her belly with her arms. Other children's tummies also gurgled in hunger. It's obvious that they are all starving, but they can't disobey their chief's orders, so they have no choice but to deal with their hunger for the next hour.  
  
Lisa was keeping an eye out for any ships out on the sea. She had been doing this for an hour now. She is also hungry like the other kids, but she didn't let it bother her that much. Suddenly, she spots something sailing between the horizon and the coast of the island. Is it a ship? Lisa takes a closer look, and it is indeed a ship. A cruise ship. The young scientist removed her glass and rubs her eyes just to make sure she isn't seeing things. She puts her glasses back on and looks at the ship again. She is not seeing things. It is indeed a cruise ship. Lisa's eyes widened. Perhaps the kids will be saved early on after all! The trip to return home is right in front of her very own eyes! Lisa immediately stood up and began alerting her fellow schoolmates.  
  
"Siblings! Cousins! Fellow schoolmates and comrades! A ship! I spotted a ship!"  
  
Lola immediately stood up as soon as she word the word "ship."  
  
"Ship?! Where?!" Lola frantically looks around the ocean, searching for the ship.  
  
"There!" Lisa pointed at the ship. "There's the ship!"  
  
Lola grew wide eyed as her pupils met the ship. Lisa wasn't lying. It is indeed a ship. A way to return home!  
  
"Oh. My. GOSH! A SHIP! IT'S A SHIP! IT'S ACTUALLY A SHIP! WE'RE SAVED!!"  
  
The kids began cheering as the great news was spilled out. Some kids even went looking for the ship in the sea and spotted it. Looks like the kids won't be spending time on the island for the rest of their lives!  
  
"WE'RE SAVED!! WE'RE SAVED!! WE'RE SAVED!!"  
  
All of a sudden, the children stopped cheering as Lola realized something. "The smoke signals! We gotta start the smoke signals!"  
  
The chief focused her attention towards the fire and gasps at the fact that the flame is smaller than its original size. Very small to be exact. The flame is about to go out.  
  
"Oh no! The fire's almost out! Hunters! DO SOMETHING!"  
  
The princess' eyes shrank to the size of an ant as she saw something made her mouth open in disbelief. The hunters are not here. They are gone. Gone? At a time like this?! It is evident that Lana and her hunters went hunting without Lola's orders. By this point, Lola is out of control.  
  
"WHAT THE HECK?! WHERE ARE THE HUNTERS?!" Lola questioned frantically.  
  
She looks back at her tribe and sees some of them trying to look away from their now-frantic chief while others began sweating nervously. Carl began whistling while avoiding eye contact with Lola. They knew the hunters left to hunt; they did not notify Lola about it and kept it a secret.  
  
"Wait, you guys knew the hunters left to hunt?! Without my permission?!" Lola grew angry.  
  
"Well, we were getting hungry," Carl replied in guilt. The others looked down in guilt as well.  
  
"The hunters were getting hungry as well, so Lana thought it was a good idea to sneak off to get food for us," Claudette added, maintaining her guilty tone.  
  
"She knew you were gonna say no, so she had to sneak off to avoid getting in trouble," Jackie added.  
  
Lola could not believe her ears. Her tribe knew Lana and her friends went hunting for food, yet they did not bother to tell Lola all because they were desperate for food.  
  
Lola is now fuming at this point, "DO YOU ALL KNOW WHAT YOU HAVE DONE?! LUCAS, MARCUS, MIKE, GUS, AND LIZZIE ARE THE ONLY ONES WHO KNOW HOW TO MAKE SMOKE SIGNALS! UGGHHHHHHHH!!! NEVERMIND THAT! LET'S DO IT OURSELVES ANYWAY! WE CAN'T MISS THAT BOAT!"  
  
"But none of us know how to make smoke signals," Darcy uttered weakly.  
  
"I DON'T CARE! I DON'T WANT TO MISS THIS CHANCE OF GOING BACK HOME!"  
  
"Uhh...I think it's too late for that," David points to the cruise ship, which is, unfortunately, more distant than it originally was. In fact, it is close to the horizon. Too far away for any person on the ship to notice any smoke signal.  
  
In complete and utter shock, Lola runs toward the edge of the peak and starts waving her arms in the air in a panic, begging for the ship to return.  
  
"No! Come back! Come back! Please come back! Don't go! Please don't go! Come back for us, please!"  
  
Lola shouted as loud as she could for the ship to come back, but her shouts fell on deaf ears. The cruise ship is too far away to hear the yells of a young girl stranded on an island with her friends, siblings, and schoolmates. The ship continued to sail away from the island until finally disappearing into the horizon, from sight. The pageant star, by this point, had collapsed on her knees in absolute disbelief. The chance of being rescued had literally left them. All hopes of returning home and seeing their families again are gone.  
  
"Come back. Please come back. Don't leave us. I beg you," Lola uttered weakly, on the verge of crying.  
  
The rest of the tribe couldn't help but feel bad for their chief. They knew how desperate Lola wanted to be rescued, and they let her down. They also began to feel guilty because they are the ones who let the hunters, aka the ones who know how to make smoke signals, loose. If they had just ratted out on the hunters sneaking off, they could've been saved. Some children even began crying softly as they cannot handle the guilt within them.  
  
As she was about to cry, Lola began hearing a group footsteps approaching her and her tribe. Could it be the hunters? Lola looks behind her and sees tips of spears slowing rising from her point of view. It is the spears of the hunters. The hunters have returned. Not long after, the faces and then the full bodies of the hunters came into view. Lana is in front of the hunters given that she's the captain of them. Her left cheek is covered in blood as well as her hands. Her right hand is carrying a bloody knife, probably used to stab an animal to death. Lana and the hunters stop a few feet away from Lola, looking happy about the work they just did without Lola's orders.  
  
"Guess what, Lols?" Lana spoke happily. "I did it! I killed a pig!"  
  
"And I have it's dead body!" Skippy held the dead piglet up in the air. It's throat had been slit and bleeding. Lana must've slit its throat since she is the only one with a knife.  
  
"Here!" the second-in-command of the hunters throws the piglet's body towards the floor next to the tribe, its blood splattering. Some children were impressed that the cool kids managed to kill a piglet while others stared at the body in disgust.  
  
"It was awesome!" Lucas cheered.  
  
"Yeah!" Lizzie agreed. "Though its dying squealing was very horrible to listen to, but other than that it was amazing!"  
  
"Yeah! You should've came with us, Lols!" Lana said. "We've found this piglet sleeping in its den. We tried sneaking up to it, but Gus accidentally stepped on a stick, causing the pig to wake up and run away from us. Luckily, I caught up to it-"  
  
"You...let the fire out…" Lola uttered in a deadpanned tone.  
  
Lana looks at her twin sister with confusion. "Okay…" She snaps out of her confusion and resumes her story, "Anyway, I caught up to the piglet and I-"  
  
"You let the fire out," Lola repeated, getting a bit upset.  
  
Lana grew a bit nervous and began sweating a bit, "Okay then." She giggled nervously. "Anyway, I slit his throat-"  
  
"You let the fire out," Lola grew more angry, gritting her teeth and clenching her fists.  
  
Lana grew annoyed from her sister interrupting her story for the third time, "Are you seriously going to repeat that phrase every time you interrupt me?"  
  
"YOU LET THE FIRE OUT!" the princess suddenly snapped, causing Lana and the hunters to flinch. The rest of the tribe did not even flinch as they knew this was coming.  
  
"WHAT THE HELL WERE YOU THINKING?!?! WHAT MADE YOU THINK IT WAS A GOOD IDEA TO DISOBEY MY ORDER AND GO HUNTING?! DO YOU REALIZE WHAT YOU HAVE DONE?! A SHIP PASSED BY! IT'S TRUE! A SHIP JUST PASSED BY! WE COULD'VE BEEN SAVED!! BUT NOOOOO!!! YOU AND YOUR DAMN HUNTERS, AKA THE ONLY PEOPLE WHO FUCKING KNOW HOW TO MAKE A DAMN SMOKE SIGNAL, HAD TO LEAVE! WITHOUT MY DAMN PERMISSION! DID YOU FORGET I'M THE FUCKING CHIEF HERE?! I MAKE THE ORDERS! NOT YOU! THANKS TO YOU, THE DAMN SHIP LEFT US! NOW WE'RE GONNA BE STRANDED ON THIS FUCKING ISLAND FOR MORE DAYS, WEEKS, MONTHS, OR EVEN YEARS THANKS TO YOU IDIOTS!!!!"  
  
Lana, the hunters, and the rest of the tribe were in complete shock at what just happened. None of them expected Lola to drop the F-bomb on the hunters; heck, the pageant queen would never use any form of profane language even when she's angry. This is the angriest Lola can get, and is it possible to make her even angrier than she already is?  
  
Lana went from being utterly aghast to growing irked herself. Lola had the audacity to curse out her and her friends for doing something simple and important as hunting for food. What they are doing is helping the tribe survive on this island for God knows how long, and Lola is just gonna stand there and berate them for doing so? Lana will not have this. No one has the right to tell them off for helping the tribe.  
  
"So what?! It's survival that's more important! We were starving while waiting for the damn ship to pass by! We were getting hungry! Do you seriously want us to starve to death before being rescued?! It's surviving on this island that we need to worry about! Not just being rescued!"  
  
Lola was taken aback by Lana's words. Not only had she disobeyed her order, but she also had the guts to talk back to her chief. This just made the pageant queen even angrier.  
  
"YOU DARE TALK BACK TO YOUR CHIEF?!?! WHAT KIND OF SUBJECT ARE YOU?! I KNOW WERE FREE FROM THE RULES OF THE ADULTS, BUT THAT DOESN'T MEAN YOU SHOULD DISOBEY MY RULES!!"  
  
Lana has grown more irked.  
  
"I DON'T HAVE TO FOLLOW YOUR RULES IF IT'S FOR THE SAKE OF SURVIVING ON THIS DAMN ISLAND FOR GOD KNOWS HOW LONG!!!"  
  
This is it. The fight had grown too much. Winston, being the assistant chief, had gotten between the twins to stop them from fighting.  
  
"Stop fighting, both of you!" Winston exclaimed. "Arguing won't bring back the ship!" He glares at Lana. "And you, Lana, respect the rules of the chief! She is not trying to kill us all! She's trying to survive, too!"  
  
"Fine," Lana uttered begrudgingly.  
  
Winston releases both twins.  
  
"If it makes us feel better, why don't we start cooking the pig so we can eat it? The hunters didn't kill this pig for nothing!"  
  
The kids, except for the Loud twins, all cheered as it was finally breakfast. They all had been waiting for this for about an hour. As the kids cheered, Lola and Lana shot hateful looks at each other. Lola still couldn't believe that Lana would dare break her rules, and Lana is still upset at how Lola would rather starve her own tribe to death in favor of being rescued by a passing-by ship. Hopefully the tensions between these two will ease, and everything will go back to normal.


	6. The Beast

After the morning feast, Lola punished Lana and her hunter friends for sneaking off to hunt and disobeying her order, much to Lana and her friends' dismay and annoyance. This means they were not allowed to go hunting for the rest of the day, and Winston, being assistant chief, had to keep an eye on them in case they decided to sneak off again. Thankfully, the animosity between Lola and Lana had alleviated, and they are both back in good terms with each other, but still, the captain of the hunters was pretty upset that she and her friends are not allowed to hunt. All she and her friends were doing was getting food for the tribe, and they were punished as a result. Every time she thought of this, her anger would slowly rise inside her only to diminish seconds later as the tomboy tried to forget about it. It isn't worth the risk to enrage the chief again after what happened during morning.  
  
Little dots of stars once again sparkled throughout the now-blackened sky as nighttime once again settled on the island and its inhabitants. Unlike last night, the children had trouble falling asleep. Their huts may have sheltered them from the rain, potential predators, and most buggy pests such as flies and mosquitos, but they were not enough to block out loud noises, or in this case, loud warlike sounds and explosions coming from the air above the island. An air battle is taking place above the sea not that far off the coast of the island. Not a real air battle, but a practice air battle. A drill. The US air force are targeting dummy enemy planes; that is, automatic, self-piloting US planes with dummy pilots inside. There are about tens of real planes and dummy planes flying around the air, creating unsettling thunder sounds reminiscent of the war thunder sounds produced by World War II war planes during the Battle of Britain. The thunderous sounds exploded through the air. The US Air Force only managed to shoot down a few dummy planes, but when they did the shots produced loud explosion sounds; not as loud as the war thunders, but loud enough to keep the kids on the island awake. Some of the youngsters, especially the first graders, were frightened by the ominous thunder sounds and explosions, causing them to quiver in fear. Others were scared as well, but they tried to ignore the sounds and fall back asleep only to be woken up less than a second later by another unsettling war sound, scaring them awake.  
  
When one US plane shot down one dummy plane, the dummy pilot managed to fall off the descending plane and began falling towards the island. As the dummy plummets faster and faster, it is suddenly slowed down by the sudden activation of the parachute. The parachuting dummy gradually floats down behind the mountain. The wind caused the dummy to scrape itself against the pink rocky slopes of the mountain, pink stains appearing on the dummy’s front part of its hard, mannequin-like body. When the dummy finally reached the tree, the parachute got caught on the branches, ripping it. The dummy lays motionless---because it is a dummy, not a real person---on the branches of the tree as if the tree is carrying the dummy like a little infant. The air force resumed their drill oblivious to the lost dummy that is trapped on the trees inhabiting the island.  
  


* * *

  
Hours passed, and the air drill had long been over. The stars elegantly glisten throughout the silent night sky as there is no more smoke created by the shot-down dummy planes to secrete them. With no more war sounds to keep them awake, the children finally received the sleep they deserved. All but two children were sound asleep. Instead of taking this time to take a night's rest now that the war drill is over, two children decided to sneak off the camp to spend some time alone together; those two kids are Petey Wimple and Charlotte Yang.  
  
Petey and Charlotte had sneaked off from the tribe to take a short stroll together along the beach while holding hands. Apparently, the two first graders had been in a secret relationship since kindergarten, not telling anyone about it in fear of being teased by their fellow classmates. Since they first met way back during the first day of kindergarten, Petey and Charlotte secretly had feelings for each other and were too nervous to admit them to one another. They finally got their chance one day at the park when, coincidentally, their families met at the playground where the young children usually played in. Of course, they had to hide from their parents so they can admit their feelings in secret. They were quite surprised when Charlotte and Petey found out they had a crush on each other, but then they laughed it off and accepted their feelings, officially starting their relationship.  
  
After about five minutes of strolling along the beach, Petey and Charlotte settled down and sat on a log, watching the bright full moon and the glistening, calm sea while setting their hands on the log, still holding together.  
  
"Doesn't it feel nice to finally hang out together after first crashing landing here on this island?" Petey asked her biracial girlfriend.  
  
"Yes, it does feel nice, cutie," Charlotte replied flirtatiously, causing the plump glue eater to blush.  
  
"W-well," Petey stuttered nervously, "you d-didn’t have to s-s-say it l-like t-that.”  
  
“But I like to say it like that, Petey-kins,” said the biter, “because I love you.” Charlotte leans toward her fat boyfriend and pecks him on his cheek. Petey’s cheeks grow redder.  
  
Leaning back to her original position, Charlotte resumes speaking, “Plus, there are no adults on this island, and our friends are still sleeping inside their huts. This is the perfect time to spend time together. Alone. Without fear. Without getting in trouble. Without getting teased.”  
  
“Well, you do have a point,” Petey admitted.  
  
Charlotte scoots closer to Petey and gently grabs his fat-filled arm. Then, she begins hugging him, gently rubbing her cheeks on Petey’s chubby cheeks and clinging her arms onto his soft, shirtless, chunky body. The fat boy’s cheeks are now bright red. His heart began beating faster as a lovely smile creeps up to his face and his eyes turn to hearts. This is the best feeling he’ll ever sense from his cute yet bitey girlfriend. Then, Charlotte begins rubbing her boyfriend’s fat belly and jiggles it for a bit before speaking again.  
  
“Petey, did your tummy just grow fatter?”  
  
Charlotte stops hugging Petey, her hands still clinging onto him.  
  
“How much fruit did you eat, Petey?”  
  
“Well...a lot actually,” the plump boy confessed. “The fruit tasted so good I couldn't stop eating them until I was full."  
  
“Well, that’s funny! I thought eating lots of fruit will help burn fat, not gain fat!”  
  
Petey giggled, “That is pretty funny.”  
  
Charlotte stands up, “Well, how about I bite off that extra weight of yours!”  
  
Before Petey can even flinch, Charlotte tackles him to the sandy ground and bites his forehead; not too hard or else she’ll hurt him. Instead of freaking out and trying to get his biting girlfriend off him, he laughs from the ticklish feeling from his forehead. Turns out, Charlotte biting him on the forehead is ticklish to Petey. Charlotte crawls over Petey and bites his belly, once again not too hard. Petey laughs hysterically from the ticklish feeling from his stomach. Then, the mixed African-American girl begins blowing raspberries on his stomach, causing the fat boy to laugh even harder.  
  
The fun the young lovebirds were having was suddenly interrupted by a branch breaking. Charlotte stops her raspberries and Petey stops laughing as they heard the sudden snapping sound. The young girl even flinched at the unexpected sound, almost falling off from her corpulent boyfriend. Something or someone had moved through the leaves of the trees, possibly spying on them. Charlotte and Petey’s heart began beating a bit faster as a sense of anxiety bestowed upon them.  
  
“What was that noise?” Petey uttered, feeling a bit frightened.  
  
“A branch had broken off,” said Charlotte, also frightened.  
  
“Did one of our friends also wake up? Does he or she know we like each other?”  
  
“I hope it wasn’t one of our friends. He or she will tell our class and they'll end up making fun of us.” The biting girl’s worriness is soon replaced by determination as she says, “But there’s only one way to find out!”  
  
The young couple got on their feet, then held hands, and finally began tippy-toeing into the forest. They have to be quiet as possible so they will not scare away one of their supposed friends. Fear plagued Petey as he was surrounded by darkness, and he was known for his nyctophobia, or fear of the dark, but that will not stop him from confronting whoever decided it was a good idea to sneak up on them and invade his and Charlotte’s privacy. Charlotte, on the other hand, didn’t mind the darkness as she was a fearless girl known for not being afraid of anything---well, except for the dentist, that is---and she will not hesitate to bite the head off of whoever was spying on them, even if it was one of her friends.  
  
Not that far into the forest, the two young children noticed a round silhouette laying on top of the branches. It seemed to be motionless at first, but then creaking can be heard as the thin, weak branch can no longer support the weight of the figure. Eventually it gave away and the branch snaps, causing the shadowed figure to fall onto a thicker, stronger branch. The forest is too dark, and Charlotte and Petey have no flashlights, so they cannot see what the figure actually is. The two kids, however, are sensing a tense feeling of dread. None of them know what the silhouette actually is, and none of them have the nerve to find out as they fear the figure was something bad and dangerous. Just then, a sudden loud rip can be heard from the top of the trees, and that sent Charlotte and Petey running out of the forest, screaming, as fast as they can. They ran faster and faster and looked behind to check to see whatever that thing was wasn’t chasing them. Thankfully, nothing was chasing them. It did not take long for the fat boy and the bitey girl to finally reach the tribe’s camp. Their curdling screams were loud enough to wake the entire camp. They did not reenter their huts, but Chief Lola’s hut where she was groggily waking up from all the loud screaming.  
  
“CHIEF! CHIEF!” Charlotte and Petey shouted in distress as they barge into Lola’s hut. They stopped running and were out of breath.  
  
“What is it?!” Lola asked grumpily as she gets into a sitting position and faces the now-scared children as she rubs her eyes.  
  
“It’s the beast! We saw the beast!” Charlotte and Petey shouted.  
  
“Beast? What beast?” asked the young chief.  
  
“The beast from the jungle! We saw it!” the two children exclaimed.  
  
“It was big!” said Charlotte.  
  
“And furry!” added Petey.  
  
“It’s claws ripped through something!”  
  
“It was so heavy it broke some branches and fell!”  
  
“That must’ve woken it up!”  
  
“And it almost ate us!”  
  
“It was the beast, we tell you! The beast!”  
  
“QUIEEEEEEEEET!!!!!” Lola suddenly shouted in anger. Not only was her beauty sleep interrupted by two annoying kids, but they had to interrupt her rest for something as ridiculous and nonsensical as a darn beast?  
  
“I don’t know what you two had been doing, but there is no such thing as a beast! It’s a made up creature! In other words, not real! You two must’ve had a nightmare!  
  
“But we weren't having a nightmare!” Charlotte and Petey persisted. “It was real! We saw it!”  
  
“Okay! Enough with the nonsense! There is no beast! Now can you please-”  
  
Lola was suddenly interrupted by millions of voices talking at the same time from outside her hut. This caused the beauty queen to grow more annoyed and angry.  
  
“Ugh. You’ve gotta be kidding me.”  
  
Lola grabs the conch, which was laying on the left side of the princess’ hut, and goes outside to see the tribe surrounding her hut looking bewildered, wondering what was all the screaming about.  
  
“What was all the screaming about?” asked Chinah.  
  
“Did something happen?” asked Gus.  
  
“Is everything okay?” Alfred asked.  
  
“Can one explain what the cacophony was about?” asked Lisa.  
  
“Everyone, settle down!” Lola shouted, silencing her tribe. They all focus their attention on Lola, hoping she would answer all their questions.  
  
“I know what all of you are thinking, and I’m sorry to do this, but we’re going to have an assembly right now!”  
  
The kids all grumbled in annoyance. They finally have a chance to get a night’s rest after hours of listening to war sounds only for them to stay up longer for an assembly.  
  
“I know, I know! You are all tired and want to get a night’s rest, but apparently Charlotte and Petey have something ‘important’ to say,” Lola announced as she made a quoting gesture when she said “important”.  
  
“Now chop chop! We have another assembly to attend!”


	7. I Saw the Beast!

The tribe had gathered inside the jungle for another assembly, which is strange considering that it is the middle of the night, and Lola usually holds assemblies during the day when the children are not tired and sleepy. Unsurprisingly, the kids still felt sleepy as some of them yawned, and their eyelids looked baggy due to lack of sleep. Apparently, the children did not get enough sleep because of the US air drill that occurred earlier that night, producing loud explosions and eerie thunder sounds that exploded through the night sky and kept the children awake for hours as a result. Most youngsters even began complaining about having to wake up for the second time after finally going to sleep as soon as the drill ceased, but they can't argue with the chief. If the chief announces another assembly, even if it's midnight, then they are obliged to attend that assembly without question.  
  
As the children sat down on logs, large stones, or the dirt-filled ground, Lola stood in front of her tribe, as if she was on stage, holding the conch and waiting for her tribe to quiet down so she could speak. Winston is standing a few feet away from his princess to the left, waiting for her to speak. Charlotte and Petey stood next to the beauty queen to her right, still terror-struck by their encounter with the alleged beast. The young, first-grade couple wanted to stay as close to their chief as possible, believing that she would protect them if the beast unexpectedly attacked the tribe. The rest of the tribe are still irked about waking up during the middle of the night after getting only an hour of sleep. Those two irksome scaredy cats better have a good reason for waking the entire tribe and convincing their chief to hold an assembly at midnight. A fireplace, located between the tribe and the chief, is built to provide light to the assembly. No one wants to attend an assembly without light.  
  
“Why are we holding the assembly right now?!” Gus complained.  
  
“After finally getting some sleep after the loud ass air battle, we have to wake up an hour later for another assembly!” added Lucas.  
  
"Well, Charlotte and Petey better have a good reason for screaming like crazy people!” exclaimed Chinah.  
  
“I hate it when people disturb my beauty sleep, and for a stupid reason,” Jackie stated disgustingly.  
  
“Ugh! I want to go back to sleep,” Skippy complained.  
  
The chief and assistant chief grew tired from hearing the endless, same, old complaints from their restless tribe. Seconds passed, and the complaints still rage on. Eventually, Winston snapped and placed his index finger and thumb in his lips and blows, releasing a loud whistle that echoed through the forest. The children all covered their ears to block out the loud, painful whistle. The birds, who were formally asleep, were suddenly awakened by the loud, echoic whistle, causing them to fly into the dark sky in a swarm, chirping and cawing. The wild pigs and their piglets began squealing and running around, freaking out over the sudden loud whistle that they never heard before.  
  
As the kids are finally silent, Winston ceases to whistle.  
  
“QUIET!” he shouted. “The assembly is now in session, so pay attention to your chief!”  
  
As told, the children all faced their attention towards Lola, wondering what the chief had to say.  
  
“I know what you’re all thinking. Chief, why are we holding an assembly in the middle of the night? I know you guys are tired and want to go back to sleep, especially the very loud air drill that kept us awake for hours, but please hold on for a bit longer. Charlotte and Petey here have something important to say,” Lola’s voice turned sarcastic as she mentioned the names of the biter and the glue eater.  
  
Lola then gives the conch to Charlotte and Petey. They share the conch by holding the conch between them with one of their hands. Petey is holding the large shell with his left hand, and Charlotte is holding it with her right. After hesitating for a bit, they finally spoke:  
  
“We saw the beast! We saw it sleeping on the trees!”  
  
“It was big!” exclaimed Petey.  
  
“And fat!” added Charlotte.  
  
“And furry!”  
  
“It has claws!”  
  
“Because we heard it ripping something!”  
  
“It was so heavy it broke through the branches!”  
  
“We thought it woke from the fall, so we ran back to camp!”  
  
“We didn’t know if it saw us!”  
  
“So we ran away just in case!”  
  
“It was the beast, we tell you! The beast!”  
  
The entire tribe groaned in annoyance after hearing Charlotte and Petey’s testimonial story. They were forced to attend this late-night assembly just to hear some little kids’ crappy story about some monster from their very own imaginations supposedly almost trying to eat them?! The tribe once again became angrily restless as not only was this assembly a complete waste of their time, but their sleep cycle was interrupted for nothing.  
  
“Seriously?! We woke up in the middle of the night just to hear some dumb little kids’ story of a monster that doesn’t even exist?!” Marcus shouted in anger, his tone turning to mockery as he says “dumb little kids’ story of a monster.”  
  
“Ugh. Ridiculous. Utterly ridiculous,” Jackie uttered in disgust.  
  
“This the worst interruption of my beauty sleep ever!” Chinah complained.  
  
“Stupides petits enfants. (Stupid little kids.)” Claudette muttered to herself.  
  
“That is so absurd!” stated Lisa.  
  
“Such species doesn’t exist! There’s no proof!” added David.  
  
The biter and the glue eater felt mocked as their fellow tribe children hurled insults and criticisms at them. They held their heads down, tears forming in their eyes. The only group that weren’t angry were the first graders. Being gullible and naive, they believed in their two classmates’ story about the beast and began to feel scared. They fear that the beast was watching them behind the bushes and is ready to attack them at any moment, so they took a few steps away from the bushes just in case. The only first graders that didn’t fall for the beast nonsense are Lisa, David, and Greg because...well...they’re smart. They’ll question or disprove anything that sounded unscientific, pseudoscientific, scientifically impossible, or just flat-out nonsensical.  
  
Aside from the now-terrified first graders, the only child that is not complaining or insulting the supposed victims of the alleged beast is Lana. The tomboy just sat on the log looking like she just witnessed some poltergeist activity. She did not move a single muscle, nor did she attempt to scratch the itch she is feeling on her nose. Lana is absolutely petrified. Not feeling any emotions but of absolute shock.  
  
Lola suddenly blew the conch, creating a loud yet enjoyable trumpet sound that echoed throughout the jungle, once again scaring and disturbing the animals. Again, everyone's attention is on the princess.  
  
"I know, I know," the pageant queen resumed. "It's the most stupid and ridiculous story you've all ever heard, and you are all angry over waking up in the middle of the night just to hear such story. I'm as angry as you all are, but I have to hold this assembly so I can calm things down, or in this case, assure these kids," she points at Charlotte and Petey, "that there is no such thing as a beast and they mistaken something else for a beast. Possibly an animal that wouldn't hurt a fly. And as chief, I have to maintain law and order."  
  
"Good! Tell those crybabies that there is no such thing as a beast!" Mike demanded.  
  
"Mike! I have the conch, so I'm the only one who's supposed to talk!" Lola scolded.  
  
"I saw the beast!" Lana suddenly shouted, snapping out of her aghast state and standing up from the log. The children all gave Lana weird looks, some of them startled, others surprised by Lana's sudden shout.  
  
Lola grew pestered. "Lana, what did I just say?! I have the conch, so only I can talk!"  
  
"Then give me the conch! I wanna say something!"  
  
Lola grumbled. She walks over to her tomboyish twin and hands her the conch.  
  
"I saw the beast! And I have proof!" Lana told the tribe. Instead of complaining from irritation the children began whispering amongst one another, still skeptical about the beast being real, yet wondering what evidence Lana obtains to prove the existence of the beast. Only Lisa, David, Greg were unfazed by Lana's sudden announcement, still being the truly skeptical ones.  
  
As the whispering settled down, Lana resumes speaking, "Do you wanna know what I have? Well, I'm about to show it." After a short pause. "I have this!"  
  
Lana holds up what appears to be a huge claw from some sort of animal. This incited gasps from the entire assembly. Even the former skeptics, including Lola herself, are shocked to see actual evidence of the existence of the alleged beast. The nerdy kids, however, are still unimpressed.  
  
"Shocking, right? I found this while we were exploring the island!"  
  
Lola snatches the conch away from Lana. "What part of the island did you explore?" she asked curiously.  
  
"The part behind the mountain," replied Lana. "A place where I like to call...Castle Rock, because the rock structures look like towers of a castle."  
  
"May I see that conch, please?" Lisa spoke, appearing by her twin older sisters. Lana hands her younger, smarter sibling the conch.  
  
"This is completely and absolutely absurd," stated Lisa. "There is no such thing as the beast, and the claw Lana currently obtains possibly belongs to a large species of predator. Possibly from a tiger or a lion. Speaking of which, may I see the claw, please?"  
  
Lana hands Lisa the claw. The young nerd scrutinizes every single detail of the claw from its pointy end to the smoothness of the claw. After a few moments of inspection, Lisa spoke again.  
  
"Intriguing. The claw seems to be too large to belong to a tiger, lion, or a bird of prey. From my knowledge, it is probable that it may belong to the megatherium. Street name: giant ground sloth, the mammalian species that lived from the Pliocene Epoch to the end of the Pleistocene Epoch, roughly 10,000 to 5 million years ago. However, there's no way it can survive the end of the ice age towards the present day. In other words, it's extinct. It's no longer around. It's dead."  
  
"Told you we were telling the truth!" claimed Charlotte and Petey. "We saw the beast!"  
  
"So it is from the beast! The beast is real!" Lizzie exclaimed.  
  
"Charlotte and Petey were right! The beast is real!" Skippy shouted.  
  
The tribe suddenly grew fearful as all of them, with the exception of Lisa and the Miller brothers, now believe there is a beast lurking in the jungle.  
  
Lola snatches the conch from Lisa and blows on it, silencing the tribe.  
  
"Everybody calm down! Like what Lisa said, there is no such thing as the beast. Though I do agree that the claw is too big to belong to any predator or an extinct animal, it must belong to a harmless animal. I just know it! Look, if it calms you down a bit I'll go with the hunters to check out Castle Rock to prove that the beast doesn't exist. With all that said, I declare this assembly to be over!"  
  
And with that, the children stood up and headed back to their huts to return to sleep.


	8. The Hunt for the Beast

The next morning, Lana and her hunters, including Lola, set off into the jungle to hunt for food as well as the beast while the rest of the tribe remained on the beach. Lola placed Winston in charge of the tribe to lead it while the princess was gone. The alleged claw that Lana found in what she calls “Castle Rock” is now in possession of Lisa, David, and Greg. The three young scientists want to analyze the claw to confirm whether it is real or not, or at least they will try to analyze the claw due to lack of archaeological instruments necessary to determine the legitimacy of the claw. If the claw is proven to be real, then the child prodigies will try to confirm whether the claw actually belongs to the giant ground sloth as Lisa hypothesized or another animal, possibly an undiscovered species science had not known about for hundreds of years. The first graders pleaded Lola and the hunters to not go after the beast in fear of it hurting or, worse, killing them if they are not careful, but the pageant star insisted that herself and the hunters will be okay, still believing that the beast is nothing but a figment of the children’s imaginations, so the kids complied. At least they will be safe with Winston and the rest of the tribe on the beach.  
  
The Loud twins and the hunters slowly sneak further and further into the wilderness and greenery of the jungle, their feet stepping on the dirt, dead grass, and small sticks and creating silent cracking noises. Each hunter is in a crouching position with their spears pointed forward, ready to throw and strike at a targeted animal. The pupils rotate around the hunters’ eyeballs, looking around their surroundings in search for a small animal potentially hiding in the trees or behind bushes. Eventually, the hunters came across a path that is littered with many footprints made by some sort of small animal, possibly a pig. Lana crouches down and inspects the footprints on the path, smelling one footprint much to her polar opposite twin sister’s disgust. After smelling the footprint the tomboy stands up and faces the rest of the hunting group.  
  
“Yep. This is the same path I walked on which led me to Castle Rock,” confirmed Lana. “I recognize the smell of the pig footprints anywhere. And, of course, mine.”  
  
“How do you know a pig made those footprints?” Lola questioned.  
  
“One, I recognize the smell of a pig. And two, I saw a few running along here while walking to Castle Rock. I call this path the pig run...because this is where the pigs run. Come on, let's go."  
  
The hunters began walking on the pig run with the mud-loving tomboy leading the way. The path is almost perfectly straight with the exception of a few small squiggles. However, the straightness did not last long as the pig run made a right turn a few meters away from where the hunters first discovered the path. As they made that turn, they immediately stopped in their tracks. Something, or in this case some animal, is in the way. Standing a few feet away from the hunters is a wild boar. The boar is huge in size, almost as big as a warthog from the African savannah. Its tusks had grown from both sides of its snout, curling upward, its pointy ends pointing at the leaves blocking the view of the blue sky. Its small grey fur is covering its entire huge body. The boar is staring at its human enemies with a threatening glare, its snout pouting out a cloud of air. The boar rubs the dirt-filled ground with its front left hoof, ready to charge at its targets. The hunters, however, are feeling at all scared or threatened. Instead, they are staring back at the boar with concentrated looks, holding their spears and aiming them toward the boar and never taking their eyes out from the boar. But no hunter is more concentrated than the chief of the tribe. Lola stares intently at the boar while tightly holding her spear, ready to throw it at the animal. She is controlling her breathing to prevent herself from becoming nervous. One speck of nervousness in her facial expression, and it’s all over. She also suppressed any thoughts about her missing the boar to her animal-loving self telling her to not hurt an innocent animal, even if she is killing for food. If any such thoughts lingered in her mind, she would shake her head to hopefully forget it. Lola had been crouching for about a minute. Her crouched legs are beginning to feel tired from supporting the weight of her bent rear and body. Lola knew she can’t be in her current position for any longer, so she has to make this quick. After a few more seconds of waiting, she finally throws her spear. The spear flew towards the boar at high speeds. The sharp end of the spear lands in the boar’s left nostril. Blood oozed from the nostril as the boar began to hop frantically and squeal in pain. A wave of happiness and excitement struck Lola as she realized she hit her target. Her spear struck the boar in its snout.  
  
“I...did it…” she uttered to herself. “I did it. I DID IT!” Lola suddenly jumped with excitement as she is finally aware that she struck her target. “I got ‘im! I got ‘im in the snout!”  
  
“Nice job, sis!” Lana congratulated her younger twin sister. “Though, you throw like a girl,” she teased before approaching the boar.  
  
This made the happiness disintegrate inside Lola as an insulting sense took over. “HEY! SHUT UP! Like you’re the one to talk!”  
  
“Please. I can throw better.”  
  
Lana hops on the boar as it still jumps around in a mix of panic and pain. “Hold still!” the tomboy shouted in frustration as she tries to keep the animal still. Lana reaches into her grass skirt and pulls out her knife. She then stabs the poor animal in the back. The boar lets out a horrible squeal as it felt a sharp pain in its back. Lana stabs the boar two more times before it finally gave up and drops to the ground dead, letting out a soft yet horrible dying squeal before closing its eyes for the final times.  
  
“Phew! Glad that’s over,” Lana said as she got off the corpse. “Now who’s hungry?”  
  
The hunters let out a energized cheer, celebrating their victory over the boar. Now they have breakfast that will feed the entire tribe.  
  
As the cheering died away, Lana asks her hunters, “So...uhh...who’s gonna take this boar home?”  
  
The hunters and Lola remained silent as they thought about who will take the boar back to the tribe. The boar is pretty big and heavy, so more than one person will have to carry the dead body back home.  
  
“Eh...guess we’ll take it,” Lucas finally answered.  
  
Lucas, Marcus, Mike, and Gus all surrounded the wild boar’s corpse and picked the heavy dead body up. They then began taking the corpse back to the tribe at a slow pace due to the heavy mass of the dead boar slowing them down. The hunters that remained are the Loud twins, Skippy, Lizzie, Mickey, Mika, and Julia.  
  
"So, shall we head to Castle Rock?" Lana asked the remaining hunters.  
  


* * *

  
  
After strolling along the path for ten more minutes, the hunters finally made it to Castle Rock. This so-called "Castle Rock" is just like what Lana described during the previous assembly: it is a rock structure shaped like a castle. Lola could not help but admire this beautiful rock structure. The way the cylindrical towers have perfectfully shaped cones with pointy tops, the arch that represents an entrance to a castle, its light pink-colored rocks, stones, and boulders, it is just so awe-inspiring. And since Lola loves to imagine herself as a princess, she always wondered what it feels like to live in a castle. It's like a dream come true.  
  
"Oh. My. Gosh. It's so pretty," Lola uttered, awe-struck by the structure of Castle Rock.  
  
"It does look like a castle," Julia noted, also impressed.  
  
"I knew you guys would be impressed," said Lana. "Let's go in, shall we?"  
  
The hunters follow Lana inside Castle Rock. The interior of Castle Rock is as big as a ballroom of a mansion or castle; the only difference is there is no roof. Once inside Castle Rock the children began exploring the interior. Small pink pebbles and stones littered alongside the rocky walls. Small pieces of grass grew on the cracks of the rocky ground. Above the left wall is a cliff where a person---if there is one living on this island---can observe the interior of Castle Rock from a bird's eye view.  
  
Lola maintained her impressed expression as she inspected Castle Rock. She feels like she was living her dream of one day visiting a castle. It may not be a real castle, but Castle Rock was enough to fulfill the pageant star's dream. She even wondered if this castle was built by people or by mother nature.  
  
"This is so cool," Mika commented.  
  
"Yeah. It's like visiting a real castle," said Julia.  
  
"It may be as big and wide as a real castle, but it is not tall enough. This tower is just decently taller than me," Skippy pointed out, comparing his height to one of towers, decently showing a difference.  
  
"Yeah, yeah. The castle's nice and all, but can we focus on searching for the beast?" reminded the tomboy.  
  
"Oh. Right," Skippy said.  
  
The rest of the hunters stopped examining the wonders of Castle Rock and paid attention to Skippy. Lola even snapped out of her awed dazed and returned to reality.  
  
"So, as you all already know, this is where I found the beast's claw, so I assume the beast lives here, but then again it could live somewhere else and the claw accidentally snapped off while the beast visited here," explained the captain of the hunters.  
  
There it is again. Lana once again mentioned her discovery of the supposed claw that belongs to the alleged beast. Lola let that thought of the claw sink into her mind. Now that she thinks about it, she remembered that Lisa and her smarty-pants friends have the claw and are analyzing it while she and the hunters are hunting for the beast. Now that she remembered, there is a likely chance that the claw may not be a claw or the claw actually belonged to an animal that is not the beast, which may confirm that she and the hunters are just wasting their time searching for a creature that doesn't exist. She had to remind Lana of this, and so she does.  
  
"Uh, Lana?"  
  
"Yes, Lols?"  
  
"Have you forgotten that the claw you've discovered may not be a claw, or it might be, but it belonged to an animal that isn't the beast?" Lola finally questioned, though she began to nervously sweat a bit.  
  
"Of course not. Lisa and her nerdy friends have it," Lana recalled.  
  
"In that case, Lisa and her friends may determine that the claw may not be real or it may belong to another animal, which means that we may be wasting our time searching for an animal that doesn't even exist!"  
  
"You don't know that yet! That's why we're searching for the beast in case it exists!"  
  
"You don't know that the beast actually exists, too!" Lola shot back, growing irritated. "We may be spending time looking for some damn beast that only existed in our imaginations! This is gonna be a complete waste of your hunters' time!"  
  
"Can't we at least try?!" Lana is beginning to get angry. "We're doing this for the tribe! We're protecting the tribe!"  
  
"Yeah. Protecting the tribe from some beast that is make believe," the princess scoffed sarcastically.  
  
This just made the tomboy turn red with rage. "You know what?! FINE! Then I'll go search for the beast with my hunters!" She faces her hunters. "You guys would help me search for the beast, right?"  
  
The hunters just remained silent and they awkwardly faced each other. Then, they scooted closer to their chief, indicating that they agree with Lola that they may be just wasting their time.  
  
Lana grew more enraged. "Fine! Join Lola if you want! I'll go find the beast myself! I'll even beat the beast with my bare hands!"  
  
"You're not going anywhere, buster!" Lola pointed at Lana threateningly. "As chief, I command you to come back to the beach with us!"  
  
"I don't care if you're chief or not!" Lana angrily approached Lola. "You don't tell me what to do!"  
  
Lola fists clenched and shook angrily as she heard those words. How dare she defy her orders?  
  
"How...dare you…" the princess gritted her teeth, glaring at Lana with a look of hatred.  
  
"Enough! Both of you!" Skippy pleaded as he got between the infuriated twins.  
  
"Let her punish me, Skippy," said Lana, still fuming. "I don't care if she takes away my hunting privileges."  
  
Lana then leaves Castle Rock, not daring to look back at her twin sister and hunters. She is going to find the beast no matter what it takes.  
  
"Come BACK HERE!" Lola demanded, about to run after her tomboyish twin only to be held back by Skippy.  
  
"Lola, let her go," said Skippy, watching his girlfriend leave.  
  
"But Skippy!" the beauty queen released herself from Skippy's arms. "She can't disobey my orders. I'm the chief!"  
  
"I know, but forcing her to come back with us will only make things worse. Let her cool down for a bit. Then things will be back to normal."  
  
Lola wanted to argue back, but then gave up. Skippy was right. Forcing Lana to come back to the beach will just escalate tensions. If she wants to alleviate the tensions, she has no choice but to let her sister be on her own to cool.  
  
The chief sighs in defeat, "Fine." She orders the rest of the tribe, "Come on everybody! We're heading back to the beach!"  
  
The group began heading back to the beach, but only one remained in Castle Rock: Skippy. Skippy couldn't help but worry about the strained relationship between Lola and Lana. Their bickering seems to be getting worse. I mean, sure Lola and Lana are known to fight with each other a lot, but this fight is...different. Skippy had a gut feeling that the current fight might turn violent, more violent than the previous fights. The Anderson feared that if the fighting worsened, law and order would disintegrate, and the entire island will plunge into chaos as many tribe children are forced to take a side. Skippy shook his head, trying to forget those dreadful thoughts. He hoped it will never turn that way. He believed that Lola and Lana will find a way to make up and just forget about the whole beast thing. After thinking for a bit, Skippy ran towards the hunters to catch up with them.


	9. The Split

On the beach, Winston and the tribe, including Lucas, Marcus, Mike, and Gus, are waiting for the rest of the hunters and Lola to return from Castle Rock. The wild boar's corpse, the one Lana killed while searching for the beast, is being cooked above the fireplace so the children can eat it for breakfast. The body is impaled horizontally by a stick that is held above the fire by two other sticks that are hammered to the sandy ground and standing like pillars. The two standing sticks are on opposite sides of the fireplace. Patty and Roxanne slowly turn the stick impaling the dead boar around so that the entire body can be cooked up instead of just one side. The two pageant girls can feel the warmth emitted by the flames.  
  
“What’s taking the hunters so long?” Chinah asked.  
  
“Yeah,” agreed Jane. “I mean...we got a wild boar for breakfast, but they’re taking so long to hunt down this so-called beast.”  
  
“Maybe they’re fighting the beast,” said Francis.  
  
“I hope they’ll be okay,” Lindsay began to worry. “Who knows how strong and deadly that beast is!”  
  
“If only I went with them,” Lotta said, looking down in guilt. “I could’ve used my super strength to beat down the beast and possibly kill it! But nope! I decided to be a coward and backed down.”  
  
Lucas slowly approached the overweight Loud cousin. “Are you calling us cowards?” he questioned, leaning towards Lotta’s face.  
  
“What? No! I’m calling myself a coward! Not you guys!”  
  
“You better be,” the Watterson leaned back, still shooting a threatening glare.  
  
Suddenly, Winston began to hear the crunching of leaves coming from the jungle. He leaned closer to the sounds and listened carefully to them before realizing who were making those noises.  
  
"Guys! I think the chief and the hunters are coming!"  
  
" 'Bout time," Patty said. "My arm is getting tired from spinning this heavy corpse."  
  
"Mine too," agreed Roxanne.  
  
The two stopped spinning the stick and joined in with the tribe.  
  
Everyone gathered behind the prince as Lola and the remaining hunters appeared from the jungle. The children were happy that their chief and the hunters finally returned to them and relieved that the hunters weren’t hurt or badly injured by the beast, not yet noticing that Lana is not with them.  
  
“Welcome back, chief,” Winston chivalrously greeted his princess, taking a bow.  
  
As usual, Lola blushed at his prince’s gentlemanly salutation. She loved how gallant of a gentleman Winston is.  
  
“Thank you, my princess,” was Lola’s reply.  
  
Lucas, Marcus, and Mike rolled their eyes at Winston and Lola’s behavior.  
  
The courteous Milbourne then moves his pupils toward the remainder of the hunters. He greets them all, and they greet him back; while doing so Winston couldn’t help but notice that the hunters are one short of a person. It was at this moment Winston realized that Lana was missing. She had not returned to her fellow tribe children. This raised questions inside Prince Charming’s mind, and he is willing to ask those questions to the people in charge of hunting.  
  
“Where’s Lana?”  
  
“Still hunting for the beast,” Lizzie replied.  
  
“She and Lola had gotten into another fight. Lola argued that we’re just wasting our time searching for an animal that might not exist while Lana argued that we’re hunting for the beast for the sake of the protection and survival of the tribe on this island,” explained Julia.  
  
“And after Skippy stopped the argument, Lana left to search for the beast on her own, ignoring the chief’s orders,” added Mika.  
  
“Oh brother,” the rich boy quietly muttered to himself.  
  
Hearing the hunters and her prince talk about the argument she had with her twin sister made Lola cringe. Being reminded that she and her hunters---at least according to her---just wasted a good amount of time hunting for a nonexistent beast caused anger to arouse inside her body, and it also doesn’t help that she is reminded that Lana decided to be rebellious and disobey her orders like Lola wasn’t appointed chief in the first place. To alleviate her rising anger, Lola walks over to Winston places her hand on his shoulder. The beloved prince of the pageant queen slowly looks up at Lola, wondering what she has to say.  
  
“Winstie, how about we start eating breakfast? Talking about what happened back at Castle Rock is making me have rather...well...negative feelings about Lana,” stated the princess.  
  
"Why of course, my princess."  
  
Lola smiled at her prince. _Such a gentleman_ , is what her thoughts think of Winston. The princess then walks away from her prince and approaches Petey and Charlotte, who look pretty excited about hearing the story about finding the beast and defeating it. What once a smile on Lola's face now faded into a look of guilt. The guilt only increased seeing the elated faces of the two supposed witnesses of the beast. As chief Lola cannot lie to her tribe children; however, she is unwilling to tell the truth to the two children in fear of making them upset, but she has to. It's her duty as chief to utter any truth no matter how upsetting this.  
  
Lola stops a few inches away from Petey and Charlotte. She sighed and finally spoke.  
  
"Charlotte. Petey. I have something to tell you."  
  
"Is it about the beast?!" Petey exclaimed excitedly.  
  
"Did you finally kill it?!" asked Charlotte.  
  
Lola cringed at the biter's question. She knew damn well that she didn’t kill the beast or even found it. She and the hunters, minus Lana, left because hunting for the beast is a waste of their time as there is a likely chance it doesn’t exist.  
  
“Actually...we didn’t kill the beast. We couldn’t find it,” the pageant queen finally uttered.  
  
“Awwwww…” the biter and the glue eater were upset. They really hoped the hunters would find the beast and kill it to get over with the threat the tribe might be facing.  
  
“I guess maybe next time,” said Petey sadly.  
  
“Actually...there won’t be a next time…” said Lola.  
  
“Eh?” This caught Charlotte and Petey by surprise. What did the chief mean there won’t be a next time?  
  
“Look, you two. I know you two are going to be upset when I say this, but I’m gonna say it.” Lola takes a deep breath and finally utters the phrase she is reluctant to say, “There is no beast! The beast isn’t real! Hunting for this ‘beast’,” she quoted with her fingers, “will be just a waste of time for the hunters; not to mention they will be tired from hunting for some creature that only existed in your minds! Thus, being too tired from hunting for more important stuff such as pigs for food! I was right in the first place, this so-called beast only existed in your imaginations,” a short pause, “and you two probably had a nightmare and confused it with reality. I mean, Lisa told me younger children are prone to be confusing dreams with real life.”  
  
“She is correct,” Lisa confirmed with David and Greg nodding with agreement.  
  
Petey and Charlotte are in complete shock at what they just heard. Their own chief still doesn’t believe in the beast despite having supposed evidence---aka the claw---for the existence of the beast. Not only that, but the chief is also unwilling to protect the tribe from what she calls a waste of the hunter’s time. What kind of chief is she?  
  
“But...but…” the two witnesses of the alleged beast wanted to utter something, but the chief put her hand up in front of them, stopping them from saying something.  
  
“Stop. Just stop,” said Lola. “There is no beast. Period. Now if you excuse me, let’s eat some breakfast.  
  
The princess walks away, leaving Charlotte and Petey in a state of disdain. They could not believe the chief does not want to protect her tribe from the beast solely because she thinks the beast is not real. They held their heads down in despair and slowly began walking towards the fireplace to get some meat to eat.  
  


* * *

  
  
The tribe children are sitting on logs they organized in the middle of camp feasting on pieces of cooked meat from the wild boar. The boar was huge enough to supply the tribe food for lunch and maybe dinner. Some children ate neatly, like the pageant children and the young intellectuals, while others ate sloppily, like the hunters, Lotta, and the first graders. The more-disciplined pageant kids were, of course, disgusted by the eating habits of the hunters, but they ignored them and went on eating. Only Charlotte and Petey are not eating sloppily like their classmates. They ate at a slower pace as they are still upset about Lola not willing to “waste” the hunters’ time hunting for the creature that “doesn’t exist.” The biter and the glue eater are even starting to think that Lola is not as great as a leader as they previously thought. They even thought that the princess was breaking her promise about protecting the tribe no matter what cost. Despite these thoughts plaguing their minds Charlotte and Petey hoped that Lola would change her mind and resume hunting for the beast as she promised.  
  
As Skippy was eating a cooked, severed leg he suddenly heard the crunching of leaves coming from the forest. The crunching sounds were similar to the sounds made by Lola and the hunters when they returned from Castle Rock, but this noise sounded a bit different. The sounds of crunching weren't bunched up together because there was only one crunching sound, meaning _one_ person is approaching the beach. After listening closely to the crunching, Skippy looks at the direction of the sounds and sees Lana walking towards the beach, her feet stepping on the dead leaves and making those crunching sounds. She has a rather neutral look on her face. Lana stops at the boundary separating the beach and the jungle and looks at her fellow schoolmates, still maintaining that dispassionate expression.  
  
“Oh. Hey, Lana,” Skippy gladly greeted his tomboyish girlfriend.  
  
This caught the attention of the rest of the tribe as they gathered around Lana to greet her, happy to see her back. Lola, on the other hand, wasn’t happy. She may be content that her tomboyish twin sister presumably decided to finally give up hunting for the imaginary beast and come back to the tribe, but she is still upset that Lana decided that she can disobey her chief like she wanted to. After a serious talk with her, she will punish Lana for disobeying the chief’s orders.  
  
“Did you find the beast?" asked Skippy.  
  
"Nope. Couldn't find 'im," replied Lana. "But that's not the only reason why I'm here!" She suddenly raised her voice.  
  
The tribe all stared at Lana with confused looks. What does she mean by not the only reason? Skippy felt his stomach churn after hearing the last sentence from his girlfriend. That gut feeling he had at Castle Rock returned. Skippy sensed that something bad is about to happen and can occur at any moment.  
  
"While searching for the beast alone," Lana resumed, "I was thinking about something, or someone for that matter. It isn't one of my friends or my classmates or the first graders or Charlotte and Petey. It was my twin sister...Lola."  
  
The mere mention of her name caught Lola by surprise. Why was Lana thinking about her while wasting her time searching for the nonexistent beast? Was it the fight they just had? Did Lana finally regret disobeying her orders and decided to return to the beach? The princess grew content thinking that Lana finally realized her mistake of ignoring her authority and decided to return to face any chastisement she will receive from her. Sadly, that isn't what Lana is talking about.  
  
"And while thinking, I finally came to realize that Lola isn't such a great leader after all," Lana finally stated, glaring at Lola.  
  
The feelings of happiness and content immediately disintegrated completely inside Lola's body as she heard the phrase "Lola isn't such a great leader after all." God knows the princess didn't do anything that would label her a bad leader, yet here she is being called just that. Hearing such phrase caused the princess' body to heat up with anger. First she disobeyed her orders; now she is calling her a bad leader. Who does Lana think she is?  
  
As Lola's indignation rose, the tribe began whispering amongst one another, wondering what did Lana meant by Lola not being a great. They immediately had their questions answered as Lana resumed her speech.  
  
"I know. It takes a lot of guts to call out a leader, and I know that, but I have reasons why Lola isn't a great leader for us! Let's start with our current threat: the beast. As you all know, Lola does not believe in beast despite the fact that I have evidence. I don't know why, but she doesn't. She doesn't want us hunters to hunt for the beast believing that it's a 'waste of time', and she doesn't want to protect us from the beast! What kind of leader doesn't want to protect her own tribe?!"  
  
This struck up a conversation among the tribes children. Now that Lana mentioned it, Lola doesn't want to protect them from the beast, if it exists that is. Some people, like the messy kids and the first graders, agreed with Lana while others, like the pageant kids, didn't buy it as they don't believe in the beast.  
  
Lana resumes her rant on Lola, "And it isn't just the denial of the beast's existence! No, no, no! Lola will also starve the entire tribe to death just to be rescued! Doesn't she know that survival is more important?! I know, being rescued will be a blessing from God, but can't we at least survive on this island first?! We would have starved to death by the time another ship had arrived! Lola cares more about being rescued than the tribe itself!"  
  
Once again, the tribe began whispering among one another. Lana does have a point about the tribe starving while waiting for a ship to pass by under Lola's orders, but she would never let them die for the sake of being rescued. What's the point of being rescued if their tribe leader would just let them die of starvation anyways?  
  
By this point, Lola had heard enough. It's one thing that Lana disobeys her orders, but calling her a bad leader for the reasons that are false is another. The princess is fuming with rage. She will not let her twin resume her rant if she can help it.  
  
"Oh, you sure have a lot of guts calling me a bad leader for the most fake reasons ever, BUSTER!" Lola shouted with rage. "WHAT MADE YOU THINK I WAS A BAD LEADER?! I DIDN'T DO ANYTHING WRONG!"  
  
"You don't want to protect us from the beast, and you want to starve us to death because you care more about being rescued!" Lana shot back. "I bet you don't want us to have fun since you want to torture us with your orders!"  
  
"THAT'S NOT TRUE! I CARE ABOUT THE TRIBE MORE THAN MYSELF! I WILL PROTECT THE TRIBE, AND I WILL NOT LET THIS TRIBE DIE UNTIL WE'RE FINALLY RESCUED! IT'S YOU WHO IS A SELFISH JERK WHO DOESN'T CARE ABOUT BEING RESCUED!"  
  
Lana is taken aback by that statement, by she won't let Lola win the argument. "YOU'RE THE SELFISH ONE! YOU DON'T WANT TO PROTECT YOUR TRIBE FROM THE BEAST!"  
  
"HOW CAN I PROTECT THE TRIBE FROM SOMETHING THAT DOESN'T EXIST IN THE FIRST PLACE!"  
  
"You know what? FINE! IF YOU'RE GONNA BE LIKE THAT, THEN I WON'T BE A PART OF YOUR TRIBE ANYMORE!"  
  
Everyone gasped in horror after hearing what Lana just said. They never expected her to say something like that. Things just turned for the worst.  
  
Lana walks through the crowd of children and stands on a log and faces the children.  
  
"Guys! Listen carefully! If you're tired of Lola's dictatorship like I am, then join my tribe! I promise freedom, fun, food, and protection! I bet I'll be a better chief than Lola! So who's with me?"  
  
Some children were reluctant to respond to Lana's question. Some of them feared that Lola would hate their guts if they abandoned her tribe and joined Lana's tribe. The hunters, however, we're willing to join Lana's tribe. By how the tomboy described it, it sounds better than what Lola had to offer, though they know the risks of abandoning their current tribe, but they don't seem to care. Without hesitation, the hunters all approached Lana and stood behind her.  
  
"Great! I have lots of members already! Who else wants to join?"  
  
Charlotte and Petey are thinking hard whether to stay with Lola or join Lana. They wanted to stay with Lola, but they also wanted protection from the beast they had come across with last night, and Lana is willing to protect them from the beast. Not to mention, Lana believes in the beast unlike Lola. Reluctantly, Charlotte and Petey slowly walked towards Lana's new tribe.  
  
"That's what I'm talkin' about," Lana boasted. She then glares at Lola, "And as for you Lola, I wish you luck on your tribe, because you're going to lose members if you continue to abuse your power and let your tribe starve to death." She then looks at Skippy, "And you, Skippy. You're the new assistant chief."  
  
"Yes!" Skippy celebrated.  
  
Lana and her new tribe then turn their backs on Lola and her tribe before entering the forest, never to be seen again. All that was left of Lola's tribe are now the pageant kids, the nerdy kids, the first graders (except for Charlotte and Petey), and Lotta.  
  
Lola, enraged, wanted to go after Lana, but was stopped by Winston.  
  
"Let them go, Lola."  
  
"But Winston. I-"  
  
"No worries. I'm sure Lana will come around, but for now, we should let her cool off and realize what she had done. By then, she and her friends will be happy to rejoin our tribe."  
  
"I sure hope so," Lola said, looking down in defeat.  
  
"Come on," said Winston. "Let's finish eating, shall we?"


	10. AN IMPORTANT AND SAD NOTICE

Hey writers, this is aguyofmanythings himself speaking. Manuel2018 himself (under his new name TheLoudArtist15) has had something sad to say. He has recently lost interest in writing _Lord of the Louds_. He stated that he just simply became bored with the story for whatever reason, and he rushed the last few chapters simply to get them over and done with. He has decided he has no intentions of writing another chapter, and so for the first time in his history, he will be leaving one of his fanfictions unfinished, and non-canon to his other fictions.

As a result, I will no longer be able to provide you with any new chapters, and I will be ending the AO3 version here, too. If you would like to continue where he left off, go ahead and get permission from him (his DeviantArt account is [here](https://www.deviantart.com/theloudartist15)) and then you may. It is a truly sad way to end this story, but what happens happens.

This is aguyofmanythings, signing off.


End file.
